Airbender's Child: Earth
by SCWLC
Summary: Zuko's friends know and trust him. Do they know him well enough, though? Does he know himself well enough? AU. Sequel to Airbender's Child: Water, followed by Airbender's Child: Fire.
1. Prologue

Title: Airbender's Child: Earth

Author: SCWLC

Summary: Zuko's friends know and trust him. Do they know him well enough, though? Does he know himself well enough? AU.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Please see Airbender's Child: Water if you haven't yet before reading this. You won't track this story so well otherwise. For everyone who's coming over from the first 'book', hiya, enjoy the prologue. Yes, there's a prologue here. No, I didn't really need it, except that 'Fire' is going to need one, and I hate to be inconsistent on format things like that. Yes, I totally skimmed past Fong. I'm sorry, but what happened there isn't important to what I'm doing.

* * *

There were a few things Zuko had found consistently true ever since he started travelling with the Avatar. The first, was that Katara and Aang were crazy optimists and could be relied on to get everyone into trouble because they just couldn't help themselves. The second was that these three teenagers were better friends than any he'd ever had, and all were closer to him than anyone in his family had ever been, save maybe his uncle. The third was that maybe he wasn't an incompetent, or evil. Maybe it was just that he was normal. That was an amazingly freeing feeling.

They had taken a boat part of the way to the Earth kingdom. Sokka was not quite himself yet again, but they were joking and sparring and wrestling the way they had done almost right since he'd joined Aang's quest. For the first time in his life, he didn't feel lonely, he didn't feel lost and he didn't feel a sense of desperation to prove himself to someone. He didn't have to be better than everyone else, he just had to try.

It never mattered to his friend that they didn't share exactly the same opinions about things and they could talk about all kinds of things he'd never been able to talk about. Silly things. Frivolous things. Girls and food and whether topknots were sillier than a warrior's wolf tail. Even when they fought, it didn't mean the friendship was over, they could both apologise and either one would admit he was wrong, or they would agree to disagree and never talk about it again.

Katara was different, but she was the same in that he couldn't alienate her with a single fight. He could still outbend her, but she was a prodigy and learning rapidly. Her mastery was a sort of technical rite of passage in the Water Tribes, rather than what he would have understood as a master. Among the tribes, there was a certain set of tests you had to pass to be declared a journeyman or a master. Within mastery there were levels of seniority, but Katara had passed enough to reach a junior master's level of competence. She'd assured him that, from what she'd seen of his bending, he was also a master by that definition. It was different from the style of the Fire Nation, where a small convocation of masters had to vote on the matter of a student's apparent mastery. It was a much harder rank to achieve there.

When he said as much, she didn't take offense, just admitted that Pakku had told her it was something she could bludgeon Aang with when he tried to get out of learning his bending. Zuko had snickered along with her. She never took it hard that she lost to him consistently in a fight and he learned from her by taking his knocks in their sparring. She was improving rapidly, however, and soon enough he was going to be outclassed unless he improved a lot himself. Katara's charming insistence that he was her stuffed tiger-seal had returned the moment they'd gotten off the boat as well.

His friendship with Aang was something else again. The young airbender often came to him for advice about people, history and understanding the war that was ravaging the world. When he asked Aang why he was asking Zuko and not Katara or Sokka, the airbender explained that Zuko had grown up in the Fire Nation, he'd lived with the last of the Air Nomads and he'd travelled all over the Earth Kingdom during his exile. Zuko knew the world and knew the people in it, Katara and Sokka had never left the South Pole until Aang had brought them with him.

He thought Zuko was the wisest member of their little group.

That alone made the former prince want to do well by his young friend. Aang trusted his wisdom and knowledge of the world and he had every intention of never letting him down. The trust, the caring and the friendship he'd found were worth everything.

It was aggravating when Aang refused to listen to him and Katara when General Fong started pushing Aang to simply magically master the Avatar State. It was as though neither could see that there were high odds mastery of that state was closely tied to a mastery of the elements. Katara eventually gave up, unable to continue watching Aang risk destroying himself in the dangerous, yet ridiculous, quest. Zuko had stuck by him, more to watch and protect, than because he agreed.

In the end, Fong turned out to be a madman, and the four teens had left on their own for Omashu. Zuko had alternately shared Shuga's saddle with Katara and Sokka on their way there. They took their time, since Aang needed to still master water, but better to do it on the move towards the city where King Bumi awaited in all his madness, than to complete the training with the Northern Tribe and then have to add in the travel time to the earthbender.

On the nights when he was alone, Zuko privately admitted that Katara's training wear of nothing but the wraps she wore under her clothes were distracting, but he firmly controlled his imagination. She was Sokka's younger sister, and besides, he knew she was completely crazy, as evidenced by half the adventures she'd dragged them into on the way up to the North Pole. He'd had quite enough of crazy in his life with his sister, thanks.

They were following the waterways on their way up to Omashu, and had stopped for an afternoon of training before making the final push to where Aang could begin his mastery of the element of earth.

This is where the next chapter of their lives truly started.


	2. The Cave of the Two Lovers

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: No, sextuped is not the correct formation in English for six-legged critter. However, since the word quadruped is Latin in origin and hexapod is Greek in origin, it is distressing to my sense of linguistic consistency. Thus, the word for six-legged I will use is Latin in origin. Thus . . . sextuped. Thank you for feeding my crazy.

* * *

Aang and Katara were training in waterbending and Zuko and Sokka had both stripped down to their loincloths, enjoying the hot day and cool water. Somewhere Sokka had found a giant leaf he was using as a float, and he'd let his hair out of his so-called warrior's wolf tail. Zuko was looking a little enviously at his friend's naturally tanned skin, and thinking that his own pallor, as much as it was a symbol of high status, didn't look nearly as nice as a tan.

Then he shook the thought off because really? What was he, a girl?

"You guys are gonna be done soon, right ?" Sokka inquired as he lay there looking stunningly disinclined to move. "We've got a lot of ground to cover if we wanna make it to Omashu today."

Zuko looked at Sokka from where he had been sprawled on top of Shuga, one hand and one foot dangling in the water. "Where'd you get your leaf?"

"There's a plant behind the waterfall," Sokka said gesturing vaguely.

Zuko left to get his own leaf while Katara and Sokka argued about whether or not Sokka was as determined to get going as he was trying to appear. Happily, he picked himself out a leaf and waded back, plonking it next to Sokka's in the water. He happened to glance up in time to see Katara standing behind a deeply blushing Aang as she adjusted his stance.

He sighed and lay down on his leaf with a sigh of contentment. "Aang's at it again."

"What's he doing now?"

"He had Katara behind him, adjusting his stance."

Sokka grunted in displeasure. "The old, 'I don't know how to hold a net, can you guide my arms?' trick?"

"Looks like," Zuko replied. "I can't wait until he's old enough to realise that, just because she's really pretty, doesn't mean she's the right one."

Looking over at him, Sokka raised an eyebrow. "Had that happen?"

"I had a sort-of girlfriend before I left the Fire Nation," Zuko admitted. "But me and Mai were as much politics and the fact that my sister was forever convincing Mai that she _was_ in love with me."

Getting a little more interested, Sokka perked up, ignoring Aang kibitzing in his octopus-bubble. "This Mai-girl pretty?"

"Yeah," Zuko said. "I mean, not as much as some of the girls, but she also wasn't stupid and she had a mean hand with senbon."

"Huh."

They would have gone back to comfortable drifting, but Momo sat up on Sokka's belly, where he'd been comfortably dozing, and flew off just as the sound of poorly played instruments reached their ears. Then the singing. "Don't fall in love with a traveling girl. She'll leave you broke and broken hearted."

Sokka was on his feet and hurrying to the water's edge. Zuko followed at a slower pace. When he saw the people he felt like whimpering. "Hey-hey! River people! And Lee! Hi Lee!"

"Hi, Chong," he said flatly. "Moku. Lily."

"Hey man! We took your advice and got married," Chong told him. "Man, you were right. People _are_ nicer when I introduce her as my wife and not the-chick-I-sleep-with-lots-and-no-one-else!"

"Kill. Me. Now." Zuko muttered in Sokka's ear. His friend was just standing and staring, disbelieving of what his senses were telling him. "Congratulations," he told Chong and Lily.

"We're nomads," Chong informed Aang and Katara. "Happy to go wherever the wind takes us!" He then strummed what he seemed to think was a dramatic chord.

"You guys are nomads . That's great! I'm a nomad," Aang told them.

"Wait for it . . ." Zuko murmured.

Chong's vacant grin turned up a notch. "Hey, me too."

Zuko hissed his annoyance. "And there we go," he said over Aang's confused and irritated reply that Chong had already said so.

Then Chong turned to them and said, "Nice underwear."

When Sokka freaked out and tried to use Momo as a cover, like an ingénue in a third rate romance play, Zuko moaned and just headed back to his leaf. If he fell asleep, maybe he would wake up and it would all be a bad dream.

It wasn't, and Sokka insisted on making him get dressed and join the other boy in talking Aang and Katara into getting going. "If he offers you the mushrooms," he told Sokka. "Don't take any. Worst mistake I ever made."

"Are they poisonous?" Sokka asked, aghast.

"No," Zuko said. "They make you see things and think really weird things and that's why Chong and the others are the way they are." He paused for a moment. "That, and the stuff they smoke, but I never tried that. The shrooms _were_ fun, though. I think that was the time I wound up sharing a bed roll with Lily's cousin Magnolia."

Sokka's eyes were very much larger than usual as he stared at Zuko.

Not much was said after that until they were both dressed and Sokka had gone back to convincing the other two they had to get moving. Zuko supported him in theory, but he also knew that it wasn't that likely they'd get moving fast. Especially not while the nomads were braiding Shuga and Appa's fur. Shuga loved getting her fur braided, and Moku was a top notch shoulder scratcher. So the two bisons lolled happily about getting spoiled by the attention.

Eventually Sokka won, nixed the idea of the secret tunnel and got them moving, but not before effectively calling his sister a wet blanket. "She's gonna put frogs in your sleeping bag for that, you know."

"Pfft. She knows it's true," Sokka said dismissively, turning his back as he tossed things onto Appa's saddle. Zuko moved a little to the left and blocked the sight of Aang handing Katara a jar for her frogs.

They took off, and moments later were under bombardment by a squad of Fire Nation soldiers. Resigned to following the directions of the same people who had managed, in their own innocent way, to destroy the last shreds of his innocence, Zuko followed everyone into the tunnel.

Shuga rumbled encouragingly to Appa the whole way. She was used to secret tunnels and nipped playfully at her boyfriend, groomed his shoulders and flirted shamelessly to convince him that the tunnel was okay. Just as they got solidly inside and the light from the sun had begun to fade, they heard a rumble and the entrance collapsed from the efforts of the Fire Nation.

Appa panicked and started trying to dig his way out. Shuga was by his side, rumbling soothingly. Appa gave her a disgruntled look that clearly said, "Are you nuts? What do you mean it's going to be fine! We're trapped!" Shuga just nuzzled him comfortingly, rumbling a little more.

As Shuga got Appa calmed down, Sokka was confidently declaring they'd be fine, he'd make a map and they'd get out. Lily, as her usual dizzy self, lit all their torches at once, sending Sokka into fits. Zuko shrugged it off.

"Why aren't you freaking out like Sokka?" Katara asked once they finally got underway.

Zuko shot her a small smile. "I've dealt with Chong before. If you react to everything, you'll only tire yourself out and make yourself crazy." Up ahead, they saw Sokka waving his hands and making squawking noises. "Case in point, Sokka."

They trudged along, Sokka in the lead making notes on his parchment. After the first dead end that shouldn't have been there, Zuko joined him at his map. "Hey. I'm not criticising," he said carefully. "I just wanted to check if you'd missed anything."

"Have a go," Sokka said, shrugging.

Sokka hadn't missed a thing, and Zuko watched as he carefully made his notes as they continued their journey. Zuko was soon as frustrated as Sokka. When Katara said, "Sokka, this is the tenth dead end you've led us to." Zuko backed Sokka immediately.

"I've been watching. Sokka's keeping an eye on things. Somehow, these tunnels are actually changing after we go through them."

Chong, inevitably, put in his two coppers. "We don't need a map. We just need love." Zuko tried to keep from smacking his forehead like Sokka. "The little guy knows it," he added gesturing at Aang.

Aang sourly replied that he wouldn't mind a map and then the tunnels rumbled. Before their eyes, a section of tunnel they had just come through shifted and changed direction. Chong's eyes became mildly hysterical as he said, "The tunnels… they're a-changin'. Ah, it must be the curse. I knew we shouldn't have come down here."

Before Sokka could really get going on his sarcastic response to that, Katara hushed them, they were attacked by wolf-bats, Appa lost his head entirely, and between the cave-in and the panic, Zuko, Aang, Katara and Appa were separated from Sokka, Shuga, Momo and Chong's nomads.

They sighed and picked a tunnel. Nothing was going to get done if they just waited around. Appa was mincing anxiously around, glaring balefully at the walls and was extremely skittish. "Aren't you worried about Shuga?" Aang asked Zuko.

"Not any more than I'm worried about Sokka or Momo," Zuko said. "Less than I'm worried about Appa, anyhow."

"How come?" Katara asked curiously.

"The enclaves in the Fire Nation are in volcanic tunnels. Shuga's used to going underground a lot," Zuko explained. "That's why it was so easy to get her in here. She's not going to panic from this any more than Sokka will."

"Huh," Aang said, and they trudged on.

It was a terrible disappointment when they found what looked like a door out and came out into a tomb instead. Appa was particularly irate at the disappointment and could be seen stomping around the space and muttering to himself in his own sextuped fashion.

Zuko joined him while Katara and Aang ooed and aahhed over their discovery of the tombs of Oma and Shu. "Do you think you can smell anything that might give us a direction?" he asked Appa. "I know you're not an eelhound, but your nose might be more sensitive than ours."

Appa nodded eagerly and started sniffing around the room. Zuko followed him, looking around for any sort of clue that might point their way out. He knew that the airbenders he'd spent so much time around, usually had clues hidden about to direct a person if they got lost and knew what the clue meant. The people who'd built this tomb had to have had a way to get out again.

"Well, I'm not sure which I'd rather do!" he heard Katara snap behind him. He and Appa turned to see her storming away from Aang who looked utterly dejected. Avoiding Katara, girls were unpredictable and scary when they were angry (especially one as already crazy as Katara), Zuko approached Aang.

"What happened?" he asked the airbender.

Aang sighed. "Katara thought that, since the legend says you need to trust in love, and the carving there, says, "Love is brightest in the dark," that the carving of Oma and Shu kissing is a clue."

"She thinks putting out the torch and kissing will get us out of here?" Zuko said, sceptically.

Aang nodded. "She said she thought it was crazy, but she suggested it anyways."

"Then what?" Zuko asked, knowing there had to be more. "Did you laugh at her?"

"No!" Aang fervently shook his head. "I was . . . um . . . thinking about it, and _she_ laughed and said it was dumb. So I thought that since she didn't want to I should . . . go . . . along . . . with it?" He looked hopefully at Zuko. Zuko just gestured for him to continue. This he had to hear.

Katara broke in, looking still irate, and snapped as she stomped back over to the boys, "So then he said he'd never want to kiss me, and when I asked what he meant by that, he told me he'd rather kiss me than _die_!"

Zuko smacked himself on the forehead. "Oh, Aang. You didn't."

"I . . . uh . . . oh." Aang looked shocked, as though the backhanded insult he'd accidentally levelled at his crush had finally worked through his consciousness.

"Anyhow," Zuko told her. "That's crazy." He sighed. "But since your brand of crazy seems to work more than not, let's get this over with."

Before anyone could ask what he was doing, he reached out a hand and used his bending to snuff the torch out. Grabbing Katara's arm, he pulled her against him, and kissed her. She let out a startled squeak as he did so, her mouth opening under his. She felt startlingly pleasant pressed against him in the dark, and for a moment, he forgot about Aang and the poor kid's crush, he forgot that this was Sokka's crazy sister, and therefore off limits and he forgot all about why they were doing this.

Then his sensed a glow through his closed eyes, and pulled away, staring upwards, startled. The ceiling was glowing green with phosphorescent crystals. Aang looked quite betrayed and they could all see the crystals marked a definite path. Zuko, desperate to stop the look in Aang's eyes, said, "How does your brother stand that your brand of crazy manages to beat his common sense so much?"

"Augh!" Katara shrieked, and threw her hands in the air in exasperation. "Boys! Let's go!" she snarled and led the way out, Appa on her heels.

Aang glared at him. "Why'd you do that?"

"I didn't think it would work," Zuko tried to explain. "So I figured if I kissed her, it would prove it wouldn't work, then we could all go back to figuring out how to get out."

"But you didn't want to kiss her," Aang clarified.

"No," Zuko told him. "She's pretty, but you're absolutely welcome to her. She's crazy. Hadn't you noticed?"

Aang shot him a narrow-eyed, suspicious look and said, loudly enough to be heard by Katara. "Just wanted to be sure that you didn't want to kiss her. Glad I cleared that up! Why didn't you let me, Lee? I _wanted_ to kiss Katara!"

Then he skipped ahead, happily certain that he'd done away with the competition. Zuko just followed behind them, grousing to himself about why he had to deal with the fallout of Aang not thinking, and why was it Katara's crazy always worked?

When they got out, Appa immediately threw himself into paroxysms of joy at the outdoors. Sokka appeared shortly after, riding on the back of a badger-mole. Shuga charged out after him and she and Appa cavorted together for a while until Momo got their attention to chatter his part of the story. Zuko stood back and watched everything, snickering when Sokka slapped a hand over the already red part of his forehead, making it redder, in response to something Chong said.

Eventually they got going, after Zuko turned down some mushrooms from Chong and Lily, and they started up the mountain for the last leg of their journey to Omashu. Zuko settled into his usual place beside Sokka and said, "By the way, Katara's going to be really angry with me for a while."

"Why's that?" Sokka asked.

"You know how she suggests crazy things and they work even though it makes no sense?" Zuko said.

"Yeah?"

So Zuko told Sokka about what happened underground. "And now Aang's made sure she thinks I think she's repulsive or something. I don't know," Zuko said. "I figured I'd better tell you before Katara told you her version."

Sokka eyed him. "Just so we're clear, you were kissing her to prove that kissing her wouldn't do anything?"

"Yes."

"I hate it when she's right for no good reason," Sokka said. "Aang really said he'd prefer to kiss her _over dying_?"

"Really," Zuko told him, shaking his head. "I couldn't believe it."

"That kid's never gonna get a girlfriend at all if he keeps that up," Sokka said with a snort. They settled into silence until they finally crested the top of the last hill before Omashu. "The journey was long and annoying, but now you get to see what it's really about – the destination."

Zuko chuckled. He wasn't much for philosophy, and really, you could say 'til you were blue in the face that it was about the journey, not the destination, but really, why were you on the journey then, if not for the destination? He crested the top and stopped dead, staring horrified at the sight of the burning city and the Fire Nation flag over the main gates.

Sokka hadn't turned around yet as he said, "I present to you the Earth Kingdom city of O . . ." he trailed off in horror as he took the sight in himself. "Oh, no."


	3. Omashu

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Okay, so this isn't so long a chapter. I'm stopping at the natural stopping point.

* * *

He'd protested, complained, threatened and generally made a nuisance of himself, but no one had listened to Zuko. He'd had to sternly tell Shuga that he expected her to behave when left alone with Appa for the duration of the rescue mission while Katara undermined him by talking about how cute baby bisons were.

So now, he was obliged to follow the other three as they waded through the city's sewers as they snuck in, in an attempt to rescue mad King Bumi. It was disgusting, degrading and Sokka's moaning about it all wasn't helping in the slightest. Most aggravating was that Katara and Aang were cheerfully not paying attention to the fact that neither he, nor Sokka were benders of a kind to easily handle the sewage. Zuko did his best to burn off and redirect things around himself and Sokka, but he couldn't always manage it and he found himself just trying to keep the worst of the gunk from going down his shirt or gumming up his swords.

Which was, admittedly, better than Sokka was doing. "Sorry," he hissed. "I'm trying, but Aang and Katara have this stuff all stirred up."

"Not _your_ fault," groused Sokka. "I'm gonna give them both what-for later. At least _you're_ trying to help."

By the time they reached the surface, Zuko felt utterly filthy and Sokka was covered head-to-toe despite Zuko's best efforts. He climbed up in time to hear Katara say, "That wasn't as bad as I thought."

"Says you," he told her as he gave Sokka a hand up.

Katara and Aang stared at them in some sort of horror before Katara whipped a barrel's worth of rainwater against them, and Aang blasted them both with air, leaving them utterly windblown and Zuko quite discombobulated. "Gleaahhh," he said as he shook his head. Suddenly he froze. There was something stuck to his neck. "What is that?" he asked, feeling rather petrified.

Sokka wasn't nearly as sanguine. "Aaahhhh! They won't let go! Help!"

Zuko tackled him at the same time as Aang. "Stop making so much noise. It's just a purple pentapus," Aang told him.

"Do you want to have soldiers come down here?" hissed Zuko. "It's after curfew!"

"How do you know there's a curfew?" Katara asked.

Zuko rolled his eyes. "There's a curfew on _every_ major city in the Earth Kingdom under Fire Nation control," he said.

"Don't use that tone of voice with me," Katara said warningly as Aang showed Sokka how to get the pentapusses off. "Not everyone grew up in the Fire Nation, you know."

A little ashamed because she was right and had no reason to have known that, and irritated because it was her and Aang's fault he and Sokka had the stupid purple things all over themselves, he just growled at her and prodded at the thing to get it off his neck.

Moments later, just as he'd expected, a patrol of three came around the corner. They'd almost talked their way out of it when the captain spotted the marks on Sokka and himself. "Hey! What's wrong with those two?"

Katara didn't miss a beat and declared, "They have pentapox, sir." When the soldier leaned too close she added hastily, "It's highly contagious!"

As the man moved back a little, Sokka, never loathe to play to an audience groaned and started rambling about how he was so sick he was dying. Maybe it was the stress, but suddenly, it struck Zuko as the funniest thing he'd ever seen and he doubled over, desperately trying to muffle his hysterical laughter as groans. In the process he managed to confuse his own lungs and developed the kind of terrible cough you get when you accidentally breathe in water.

He was still doubled over in a combination of giggles and coughing when the three men ran off, going on about someone's cousin Chong dying of the imaginary disease. "Okay, Lee," Katara said. "You can stop now."

"Not . . . actually . . . faking," he gasped between coughs. "Gimme a sec."

"You okay?" Katara was suddenly kneeling next to him, concerned.

It had finally worn off, and he told her, "Yeah." Still a little out of breath, he took a moment, then said, "I was just laughing so hard, I think I just . . . breathed in some spit or something."

"It wasn't that funny," she said.

"Says you," Sokka retorted smugly.

They made their way through the city, eventually reaching the fortress at its centre where Bumi might be held. They were creeping along, slowly, when Zuko saw a familiar face in the flickering torches held by four attendants around the noble family sent to govern the city by the Fire Nation. "Mai," he whispered. He'd always avoided her. But sometimes, when his sister wasn't around, they'd had an understanding. He was abruptly filled with a strong sense of homesickness. Aang saw something else.

Zuko jerked back to awareness as Aang leapt forward, slamming a blast of air through the falling debris he'd spotted, preventing the deaths of Mai and her family. As was only natural, given the way Fortune loved to mess around the Avatar and his friends, Mai's mother shrieked, "The Resistance!" and pointed an accusatory finger at the boy who had just saved her life.

"Typical," grumbled Zuko as he turned to run. Behind him, he heard the unmistakeable sound of Mai's senbon and whatever other deadly throwing weapons she was carrying. "Run!" he urged the others.

Katara, impressively, managed to block one of Mai's frighteningly fast dart spreads. Aang blocked another of her shots, and then they were running out of places to run to. Then suddenly, they were falling. Thankfully it was a rescue by the city's resistance, who led them through their tunnels to an open area where the resistance had gathered to plan. "The day of the invasion, I asked King Bumi what he wanted to do," said the leader. "He looked me in the eye and said, 'I'm going to do . . . nothing!'." The man sighed, heavily, sadly, then told them, "It doesn't matter now. Fighting the Fire Nation is the only path to freedom. And freedom is worth dying for."

Zuko sighed internally. A Fire Nation soldier would fight until he dropped, but not when there were unwinnable odds and the chance to pick up the fight some other time. Well, if he had any sense, anyhow. This? Was totally typical of earthbenders. Once they were set on a notion they wouldn't let it go.

Aang tentatively suggested, "Actually there's another path to freedom. You could leave Omashu. You're directing all your energy to fight the Fire Nation. But you're outnumbered. You can't win. Now's the time to retreat, so you can live to fight another day."

Hoping to convince them, Zuko added, "It's not running away. It's a tactical retrenchment so you can make your stand on more favourable ground."

The Avatar sent him an impressed look. "What Lee said," he told the man.

When his men seemed to be in favour of the idea, particularly the 'living another day' part, the rebel leader said, "Fine. But there's thousands of citizens that need to leave. How're we going to get them all out?"

As was usual in a situation like that, Sokka shone. With a cheesy grin, he declared, "Suckers!" The bright tone of his voice made it clear it wasn't a derogatory statement, but everyone was stymied until he explained. "You're all about to come down with a nasty case of pentapox."

While the others were retrieving the pentapusses, Zuko caught Sokka alone for a moment to ask, "You just want to play walking dead again, don't you?"

"It's a benefit," Sokka told him.

Eventually they had every civilian and resistance member willing to leave the city covered in the small red dots. After a pep talk from Sokka about the best way to look like a walking plague victim, they collectively started off through the city streets. Zuko had deliberately taken a position at the rear to help stragglers along, and because if the soldiers caught on, someone needed to be back there to help defend the rear.

In the end, however, he didn't need to. The Fire Nation soldiers practically ran at the sight of the crowd of shambling citizens. Every last one of them made their way out of the city, entirely unmolested. After it had become clear they had their occupiers on the run, he'd even fallen in with a group of teenaged boys who, trailed by their annoyed, faking mothers, had started chanting, "Braaaaaaaaiinnnssss," as they shambled with their arms stretched out before them. It was great fun.

Somehow, the Fire Nation soldiers were so far gone, they never even caught the walking dead reference, and were only doubly frightened by the apparently delirious teenagers.

That evening, when he caught up to Sokka, they snorted and giggled over it (manfully), while Katara made disgusted noises about boys and immaturity.

Shang, the leader of the resistance showed up then, putting an end to the moment, as he told them that somehow, they'd gotten an extra. A one-year-old baby had followed them out of the city, clinging to Momo's tail the whole time. A Fire Nation child was now in the camp.

Naturally, Katara insisted on taking care of him, cooing over the baby the way she'd cooed over the bison calves. Zuko just frowned at the kid, trying to figure out why his face was familiar. Though he shot a very aggravated look at Shang when the man declared the baby was definitely an incipient killer.

Katara dispelled that argument before it could even begin by holding up the baby and saying, "Does this look like the face of a killer to you?"

"She'll either make the best, or the worst, mother in the world," he told Sokka in an undertone. "No way she'll take the middle road on that." Sokka snickered back.

Suddenly, a messenger hawk came to a screaming landing on a nearby rock, making the leader point out the obvious. "A messenger hawk!"

Zuko rolled his eyes while Aang retrieved the letter. "It's from the Fire Nation governor. He thinks we kidnapped his son. So . . . he wants to make a trade. His son for King Bumi."

Zuko sat up, startled. "That's not standard policy."

"Maybe not," said Katara, "But it's probably pretty standard for a father worried about his children."

He frowned. That had never occurred to him.

"You realise we're probably walking right into a trap?" Sokka asked.

But Aang insisted and so they went. Back into the city they'd just escaped, marching up to where the trade was to take place. When they reached the scaffolding, Zuko froze. Why did the universe hate him so much? There, with Mai on one side and Ty Lee on the other, was Azula. For a moment, it was like he'd fallen backwards through time, and they were in the palace gardens, Azula manipulating everyone around her to get her way while Zuko was pushed around and mocked mercilessly just because he was a sucker enough to play fair and be nice.

Somehow, it wasn't surprising, as he hung to the back of their little group, that Mai listened to Azula and chose not to trade the king for her baby brother. For a moment, while everything erupted into chaos around him, he stood frozen. Then he heard his sister shout in surprise, "The Avatar!"

She was fast, already ascending, chasing after Aang who'd perched himself atop Bumi's metal cage, but Zuko was on her just as quickly. "Azula!"

"Brother!" she said, a manic look in her she stopped dead, staring. "How did . . ."

He smirked. "There are a lot of things you _don't_ know, sister-mine," he told her. "Just think. If the Fire Nation had exterminated the Water Tribes, I'd never have had my face back. That's something the oh-so-superior firebenders can't do."

Her eyes sparked with fury. "You're not here about the Avatar, are you?"

"No," he told her. "I'm here to stop you."

But if ever there was someone focused on the job at hand, it was Azula. As handily as ever, she fought him off without batting an eye, and still managed to stay on Aang's tail. "Oh, Zuzu, pathetic as ever," she crowed. "Are you still that desperate for Daddy's approval too? You're not going to get it this way."

"No," he snapped back at her. "I can't imagine why I ever wanted the approval of a psychopath and a killer anyhow."

"That's our father!" she shrieked in sudden fury.

He smirked at her, delighted to have gotten a rise out of her for once. "No," he said. "I don't have a father. Just like you don't have a mother," he told her, hitting the one sore point he knew she had.

With a scream of fury, she abandoned her chase and came after him, her arms spinning out the blue fire she'd always been so proud of. They both hit the ground hard in an open square, blast after blast of fire clashing between them. He was so absorbed in the fight, he didn't even notice the bisons' arrival until Katara shouted to get his attention. Shuga and Appa were hovering overhead. She was about to have him on the run, and he knew it. Better to make like an airbender and get out while the getting was good. "So long little sister!" he shouted mockingly as he blasted his fire downward to give himself extra lift into Shuga's saddle.

Shuga took off before Azula could follow. That was when Zuko sighed in disappointment. He still wasn't good enough. She was better. She'd _always_ be better.

There was a sudden thudding behind him and he turned to see a grouchy-looking Sokka in the saddle behind him. "I didn't mean I wanted to be tossed from Appa to Shuga _while we're flying_, _Aang_!" he shouted toward the innocent-looking Avatar.

"What . . ." Zuko trailed off.

Sokka leaned back against the back of the saddle. "That was some pretty awesome bending down there," he said.

"I'm not good enough," Zuko snapped back. "I'll never be as good as her."

"So that was the little sister, huh?" Sokka asked carefully.

He closed his eyes for a moment. "Yeah. That's my sister Azula," he said. "Crazy, evil and . . . a damn firebending prodigy. She's just . . . so good at _everything_."

"You seemed to be handling yourself fine out there," Sokka said.

"She was letting me," Zuko said in irritation. "It's what she always did. Make me think that maybe I'd finally caught up, then she'd just . . ." He waved a hand in the air.

Behind him, Sokka said, "I don't know. From where I was sitting, you'd backed her into that corner, you had a barrage going she could only block and not retaliate, and I'm pretty sure I saw you use that waterbending thing where they catch something thrown at them and wing it right back. I mean, unless you're able to make blue fire like her, which would be pretty impressive too."

He froze. Looked back over the battle, and suddenly saw what his self-pity had been hiding. Azula had been expecting that he'd had no teachers since then. She'd been expecting the forms he'd learned before he left the palace and nothing else. Her overconfidence had given him the advantage he'd needed to really let loose. He'd been winning.

Maybe it was only due to the element of surprise, but . . . "I really _was_ winning," he said in wonder.

"So now that you're over that," Sokka said, "Can you tell me who the girl in pink was? She poked Katara a few times, and now my sister can't bend. Which, great! Because whenever she plays with the magic water I get soaked, but less great because she's sort of defenceless without it."

"Dressed in pink?" Zuko frowned. "Oh! Ty Lee . . ." For the rest of the flight, he told Sokka all about the three girls. Later that evening, Aang told them Bumi had sent away to find a different teacher. One who knew neutral jing.

With the loss of Omashu, once again, everything changed.


	4. The Swamp

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: I'm not really happy with this chapter, but I'm in a state right now that I won't get anything done at all if I start rabbiting on about standards. So I'm posting this and letting it go.

* * *

Having no particular direction to go in, they'd just picked a direction and flown away from all known Fire Nation holdings on the Earth Kingdom continent. Crossing over swamplands, Zuko had suddenly sat up sharply, staring across as Appa.

His companion on Shuga that flight was Katara, who frowned and asked, "What's wrong, Lee?"

"It's Appa. Aang's ordering him down. I'm just trying to figure out why. There's virtually nowhere to land here," Zuko told her. He directed Shuga in closer just as Appa levelled out. "Aang! What's up?"

"I think the swamp is calling to me!" Aang shouted back.

Sokka sounded very doubtful as he yelled, "I really don't think listening to swamps is what Bumi meant!"

"It looks pretty ominous down there!" Katara shouted.

Aang made a face, but directed Appa back up as he said something to Sokka that Katara and Zuko were too far away to hear. Just as they began to gain altitude again, a loud noise attracted the attention of everyone in the air. A tornado came roaring up out of nowhere and sent them tumbling out of control through the air.

As they fell, Zuko grabbed Katara and, after trying to airbend them a safer pocket, grimly firebent jets to propel them around and try to cushion their landing. It was a trick he'd been taught by Jeong Jeong, and he silently thanked his mentor for the learning when he managed to touch Katara and himself down safely.

After a few minutes of waiting, he finally told her, "Katara? You can let go now."

Her hands had managed in her panic to worm their way under his shirt and cling desperately to him, and her right leg had gotten wrapped around his left, while she'd buried her face in his chest. Zuko kept his face very straight as she pulled away slowly. "Oh." She stepped back fully, took a deep breath, then said, "Thanks, Lee."

"You'll just have to rescue me from drowning some time," he told her with a small smile.

"I'd rather not have to," she told him wryly.

They finally started looking around, and spotted Aang and Sokka through the trees. "Aang! Sokka!" Katara called, hurrying to her brother and friend. "Sokka! You've got an elbow leech!" she exclaimed.

"What? Where! Where!" Sokka demanded, panic making him spin around like a ferret dog chasing its tail.

Zuko leaned back. He could watch this for hours. Katara spoiled his fun by telling her brother, "Where do you think?"

Sokka sourly pulled the thing off his elbow, tossing it back into the swamp. Then he caught the look on Zuko's face. "Why didn't anything bite _you_?" he grumbled.

"Because-"

Katara stopped his fun again. He never got to say that it was because "Suckered animals wuuuuuuv you," the way he wanted.

"Because Lee managed to land us out of the water," Katara said sharply.

While she went ahead to consult with Aang, Sokka gave him a suspicious look. "What were you gonna say?"

"Why would you think I was going to say anything else?" Zuko asked, trying to blink innocently at his friend.

"Do you have something in your eye?"

That was pretty much the last fun they had for hours. Appa, Shuga and Momo were all missing and Zuko had to agree with Katara and Aang that it felt like something was watching Sokka chop his way through the undergrowth, and it didn't approve. Unfortunately, there was no way to put it that didn't sound crazy and superstitious the way Katara and Aang did. If there was one thing Sokka did not approve of, it was superstition and crazy.

Bad luck in a sister for the guy.

When they made camp for the night, by silent mutual consent, Zuko and Sokka wedged Katara and Aang between them and both slept with their weapons at hand. In the end it didn't do any good as they were all woken at once by terrifying animated vines wrapping around them and tossing them all in different directions, leaving Zuko separated from all his friends and alone in a swamp. He could almost feel the dampness in the air muffling his inner flame.

He pulled himself together and started walking back in the direction he thought he'd come from. Suddenly, he saw a flicker of orange light to his right and a figure dressed in Fire Nation clothes. Cautiously, Zuko clambered around, staying out of the hampering water, setting up an ambush of the man. When he finally got close enough, the shock made him slip and fall with a clatter. He sprang to his feet, staring. "Lu Ten?"

The face that had seemed so grown up when he was eight and seeing his cousin leave with the army to take Ba Sing Se now looked very young. His cousin had been only nineteen when he died, a mere three years older than Zuko was now. "Oh, Zuko. How've you been little cousin?"

"Lu Ten," he rasped, reaching out to touch one of the few people in his life that hadn't looked down on him. The affection had been distant and perfunctory, the dutiful affection of an older cousin who didn't want a child hanging around, but it had been better than the nothing he got from his parents.

His hand passed straight through the apparition, which vanished as if it had never been. Another familiar voice laughed behind him. He whipped about, seeing the smiling face and comfortable girth of, "Uncle?"

Suddenly, the man stopped laughing and said, sadly, "You pushed me away Nephew."

"I . . ." he didn't know what to say to that. He knew he shouldn't, but he couldn't keep from reaching for his uncle. The man disappeared, just like Lu Ten had, and Zuko felt sick. Did this mean his uncle was dead?

Maybe it was the spot, maybe it was the swamp, Zuko didn't care. All he cared was getting away. In his frantic escape from his worries about his uncle and wondering why a visitation by Lu Ten, he didn't watch where he was going and bowled Katara right over. He hit her with so much force, they literally rolled over, and after a moment, he was lying on her back with her draped over him. When she sat up, he saw she'd been crying. That (perhaps a little deliberately on his part) drove all thoughts of Lu Ten and his uncle from his mind. "Katara? What's wrong? Are you alright?"

She grimaced a little. "I just . . . I just saw my mom," she told him.

"Your mother?" Zuko said frowning. Then his eye widened. "Sokka said that she was . . ." he trailed off. 'Dead' was the word he was looking for, but it wasn't all that tactful.

"She died," Katara told him, nodding. "I was looking for you and the others and I saw her . . . but then it was just a stump." Her lips trembled and fresh tears started to pool in her eyes.

He sat up and wrapped his arms around her. He'd learned Katara was a hugger since joining the Avatar, and even though he still felt awkward about it, the Fire Nation was generally not a particularly demonstrative people and the royal family even less so, it seemed the thing to do.

It was, because she immediately curled into him, wrapping her arms around him and after a few hitching sobs, seemed to calm down and settle. Soon enough her head was comfortably resting just under his chin and despite the fact that they were in a swamp, a sense of rightness suffused him. It lasted until Sokka came stomping through the undergrowth and yelling about what Zuko was doing to his sister.

That was when they both realised she wasn't just in his lap, she was straddling his hips and the position was startlingly intimate for two people lost in a stinky swamp. Sokka was having a panic attack about how boys only want one thing, and Aang was looking quite betrayed by it all.

Katara scrambled off him. "Look. I just saw a vision of Mom, and Lee was comforting me. That's all."

"I was chasing this girl," Aang said, suddenly. "She was laughing and wearing a fancy dress."

"Look, we were all just scared and hungry and our minds were playing tricks on us. That's why we all saw things out here," Sokka said.

Katara frowned at her brother. "You saw something too," she said.

Sokka looked away from her, his jaw clenching a little as he searched for calm. "I thought I saw Yue. But, that doesn't prove anything."

Unfortunately, this many people having visions proved that _something_ was going on. "I saw my cousin. And my uncle," Zuko told them. He added. "Lu Ten's been dead for years. He died in the siege of Ba Sing Se."

"And your uncle?" Katara asked.

Zuko heard his voice crack as he said, "I don't know. Your mother is dead, Yue's dead, Lu Ten is dead . . ." he trailed off. "Last I saw my uncle was at the siege when we were at the Northern Water Tribe, and he was okay then, but . . ."

"What?" Katara practically shrieked. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"He's Fire Nation," Zuko said. "And he was part of the invading force. I can't just-"

"He's family," Sokka told him definitely. "There's nothing more important than family and Arnook would have understood that."

Aang's eyes narrowed. "You were protecting the airbenders."

"I failed at that before," Zuko told him. "I failed the enclave in Cheng Dhu. I can't mess up again. Not at that." He looked a little uncertainly at Aang. "And I was always told we were supposed to think of the others in the enclave as family. So . . . who was I supposed to choose?"

Sokka was going to say something, clearly something acerbic, about that, when suddenly, something huge, green and leafy came lunging out at them from the water. They hastily scattered.

It went for Sokka first, and Aang, who was closest, freed him with an air slice. Katara came in from the marshy water of the swamp, punching a hole through the monster's shoulder. No matter what they hit it with, it would either regrow the vines, or reach out and somehow pull more in to repair the damage.

Zuko launched himself at it with an attack that combined his swordplay with his firebending to extend his reach and damage with the blades. He miscalculated as he ran at the monster. The first few slices of his forms seemed to be making headway. Then he missed the next and suddenly the vines had snagged his arms and legs, pulling them tight to his body. He tried to take a deep breath, but they were wrapped around his head before he could. In no time, he was, somehow, trapped inside the writhing mass of vines.

Breath is the centre of all firebending. But what do you do when you can't breathe?

Katara came to his rescue, something he knew first because of the vines freezing around him. Suddenly he felt something slam into him, the vines cushioning the blow, launching him free of the creature and sending him and Katara flying backwards through the air to land with a heavy thud that knocked the wind out of him.

He was still gasping when Katara raised her arms in fury, bringing them around and down again and again to slice the vines to pieces. Moving faster than the thing could recuperate, she just cut and cut and cut. Suddenly, Sokka shouted, "There's someone in there! He's bending the vines!"

The words seemed to further energise the waterbender and Katara was positively magnificent as she ripped the vine monster to shreds, revealing the loincloth-clad man within.

Aang had pinned the man, demanding to know why he would call the Avatar to the swamp just to kill him. It turned out the man, Hue, had seen his actions strictly as defending the swamp, but went on to give them some rigmarole about the sacred swamp and how the world was one organism. Zuko rapidly tuned out after that, annoyed with the latest delving into philosophy he was suffering.

That was, until Hue told them that the swamp showed them, "People we've lost. People we loved. Folks we think are gone."

Zuko cut him off, horrified. "Does that mean that my uncle's dead?" he demanded. They'd hugged, they'd said their farewells, so he didn't have to have his last words before his uncle being the condemnation of the siege of Ba Sing Se, but still . . .

Hue gave him a pitying look. "The swamp tells us those people aren't really gone. We're still connected to 'em. Time is an illusion and so is death."

Stifling the snarl, Zuko stomped off a little distance away. He didn't want platitudes and he didn't want philosophy. He wanted to know if his uncle was still breathing or not. He sulked until a flash caught his eye and he saw Aang start to glow. The moment it ended, the airbender snapped, "Come on! We've got to go!"

They all raced after Aang, and soon found the missing animals. Zuko was furious to see Shuga tied up and straining to get to Appa. He ran to her, firebending his way through the crowded swamp dwellers with a vengeance. Soon he had her free and the mostly naked people had backed off.

For several hours, Zuko chose to ignore the others. He'd let himself forget about his first and best friend, he didn't want to be falsely comforted about his uncle and he certainly didn't want to talk to or about the swamp-dwelling waterbenders. Instead he groomed Shuga, checked her for injuries, groomed her again, fed her some treats, scratched her in all her favourite spots and then did all that for Appa when she insisted by picking him up in her teeth and dropping him on Appa's back.

Katara was determined, however. She got him to join them at the fire, to eat something offered by the swamp people. Finally, she got him involved in a bet about whether or not Sokka was going to eat the bug's eyeballs.

That led to a disagreement between him and Sokka about whether or not Zuko was man enough to eat an eyeball.

They were both stunned into silence when Katara, sick of the stupid discussion ate four just to make them stop talking. She was suitably stunned when the boys unanimously declared her the winner of their manliness contest.

"Serves her right for interfering," Sokka said firmly, once she'd marched off in a huff over being called 'manly'.


	5. The Blind Bandit

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: The rings issue I stole from someone else, if you recognise it elsewhere, that's probably where I took it from. I hope the length makes up for the wait on this, but I'm really not able to write at the same rate as I was before. I actually smooshed the ending a lot to finish this up.

* * *

Zuko had been watching Sokka for about an hour now, and not only had his friend not stopped his disturbing behaviour, he also didn't look likely to stop it any time soon. Finally he couldn't stand it any more.

"Are you going to make love to that thing back there?" he asked. "Because if you are, let me know so I can land and be somewhere else."

Sokka glared at him. "I don't see you getting rid of those swords any time soon."

"You also don't see me sitting comfortably on Shuga's back and only going after my things once the camp has been totally overrun."

"I forgot I'd taken it off!"

Zuko rolled his eyes. "All I'm saying is that while I'm glad you have it back, would you please stop fondling your boomerang back there?"

"I . . ." Sokka looked at him with deep suspicion. "Just steer."

Eventually they landed, having to go on a supply run, and headed into town. Things went as well as they could, considering that Aang kept wanting to buy exotic fruits they couldn't afford, Katara kept sighing over little odds and ends she thought would make life on the road easier, but that they didn't actually need. Sokka was just marching around, looking more self-important than warranted, and Zuko felt most in sympathy with Katara.

He fell to the back of their foursome with her, helping her corral the other two. Finally they had finished the necessary shopping and Katara broke out a little money for each of them to buy luxuries.

They split up, Aang and Sokka heading one way, Zuko and Katara heading another. She led the way right back to the stalls of weird and wonderful camping gear she'd been looking over. "Why do you do that?" he asked.

"Do what?" She paused in her perusal of collapsible pots and pans.

"Give them money to waste on silly things."

Katara sighed voluminously. "Do you remember the first time I tried to keep them to essentials?"

"Yes." Aang and Sokka had taken the money and blown through half the budget on whistles, hats, weapon cleaning supplies and a pet sparrowkeet he'd had to sneak into another town to sell the next day.

"And the second time?"

Sokka had whined constantly about a lack of meat and had gone back in order to buy more meat from the butcher than the three of them who ate meat could eat.

"And the third?"

Aang had had his revenge, buying up half of a vegetable stall before Katara found him and dragged him off.

"And the fourth," she added pointedly.

Zuko winced. He'd taken the money for an expensive, and in retrospect, totally unnecessary refit of his sword handles. "Sorry."

Katara sighed. "The point is, if I let them spend a little on stupid things now, they're less likely to go crazy and waste all our money on stupid things later."

"Point taken," said Zuko. Then he promptly reminded her that the automatic flint striker wasn't necessary because they were travelling with a firebender.

She flushed. "Sorry. It's just . . . I guess I'm still not totally used to the idea that you're here to just . . ." she made a loose fist and jabbed it in a vague approximation of a fire fist.

"That was the worst technique I've ever seen," he told her jokingly.

She grinned and the good naturedly bantered back and forth while she settled on a small portable spice transporter that came with various dried spices already in it, and he picked up some hair combs on the sly at the flea market to give Katara as a surprise when she was feeling like no one noticed she was a girl.

He never wanted to hear that conversation again, but she'd bitterly complained to the girls in the swamp about travelling with boys and how she wanted someone to treat her like a girl once in a while, in a way that didn't include Sokka's pants hitting her in the face when he threw them at her to mend.

While there was no telling about Water Tribe customs, combs were the gift of choice in the Fire Nation. There were combs given as engagement pieces – it was traditional among firebenders to avoid rings because a halo of fire around the hands and a metal ring was just asking for trouble. There were combs exchanged at the wedding altar. Combs were given between courting couples and fathers often gave their daughters combs when they were old enough to be presented to society or reached other milestones. They were also given from brothers to sisters as signs of affection. Different styles of combs meant different things.

These were simple wooden combs with some pretty scrolling decorations that reminded him of stylised waves. Perfect for a brother to give to his sister, or a platonic, but close friend, to give to a friend who was a girl. Or, he admitted, for a boyfriend to give his recently acquired girlfriend as a birthday gift. He didn't have to tell Katara that last one. They'd look good on her her though.

He stuffed the combs away in his pocket and went to join her, refusing to answer any of her questions about what he'd gotten. When they caught up to Aang and Sokka, they found Aang waiting, past the point of impatience and into a sort of glazed-over annoyance with the self-proclaimed 'leader' of their little band. Sokka was agonising over a bag.

"It's pricey, but I really do like it."

Katara, recognising the look on Aang's face, agreed to move things along. "Then you should get it. You deserve something nice."

"How long has he been at it?" Zuko asked Aang quietly.

Aang moaned. "Ten minutes. 'It costs a lot, but I like it. Do I like it enough to buy it? It's pretty, though, and it brings out my eyes. But do I _need_ a bag?' On and on and on . . ."

"I thought only girls did that," Zuko muttered to him. "Not that I'd say that when Katara could hear, but Sokka's the first guy I've ever seen who did that."

Shaking his head, Aang said, "I didn't think anyone could waffle this long over a bag."

Sokka had finally decided to waste his money on the bag, so the other three started into the street, figuring they'd let Sokka catch up when he did. As they slowly moseyed away, a man came up to them, hissing, "Hey, you kids like earthbending? You like throwing rocks? Then check out Master Yu's Earthbending Academy." He handed them a flyer, then scampered off.

Zuko felt rather sceptical of the whole matter, even more so when Aang said there was a coupon for a free lesson on the back. Still, it was a better lead than they'd had so far. Off they went, Aang to take his class, the older three to hang out nearby and wait. They had a cup of tea, chatted, all three agreeing that one thing about travelling with a twelve-year-old was that the general maturity level of their group was not all it could be.

Finally they headed back, meeting a somewhat unhappy Aang who had somehow gotten dirt _in_ his ears. He told them, not surprisingly for Zuko, that Master Yu was not the teacher he'd been looking for. They turned to leave, when two boys wandered past.

"I think The Boulder is gonna win back the belt at Earth Rumble 6," said the first. He had messy dark brown hair and his face seemed set in a perpetual smirk.

The second had all his hair shaved but one silly-looking tuft of lighter brown hair poking up from the top of his head. "He's gonna have to fight his way through the best earthbenders in the world to even get a shot at the champ," he replied.

Since they really had no leads on an earthbending teacher for Aang, a tournament was, again, as good a choice as any for a place to look. When Aang scampered over to ask, they reacted just like every bit of propaganda about earthbenders Zuko had ever heard. He sighed. He hated earthbenders. The normal people of the Earth Kingdom were wonderful and kind. The earthbenders were just . . . muleheaded.

After the pair walked off laughing and while Sokka snickered over the crappy joke they'd made, Katara went after them. Zuko, curious, went after Katara. He watched her first politely ask the boys a second time, then when one of them tried a line he was sure must have come from, "The Big Scroll of 100 Stupid Pickup Lines", "Hey babe. Are you a firebender? 'Cause you're makin' me hot."

She just smiled sweetly and told them, "I really want to be able to go to the Earth Rumble Championship. Since you know where it is, you're going to tell me." Her hands flew into the air, twisted, and all the water in the rainwater barrels flew into the air, yanking the boys five feet off the ground and freezing them in the air, prone with their heads just touching at the top.

Tufty stammered out the answer, then said, "Let us go? Please?"

"You'll thaw out eventually," she told them. "After all, you were just complaining about the heat. Why don't you enjoy the cold for a while?" She sashayed to the end of the alley, and looked at him, startled. "Lee! Why'd you follow me?"

"I wanted to know what you were up to," he told her. "And now you are my hero. That was great."

"Firebender jokes," she groused as they made their way back to the other two. "Why is it always firebender jokes?"

"Would you rather it was earthbender ones?" he asked her, "I can only get something about whether they have the stones to handle you." He grinned at her easily. "Which they don't."

"Lee!" She gave him a shove. "You ready to find an earthbending teacher ? Because we're going to Earth Rumble 6!" she declared to Aang.

Aang looked a little awed. "How did you get them to tell you?" he asked her.

Katara grinned at Zuko, but said coyly to Aang, "Oh, a girl has her ways."

The trip to the tournament was short, and Zuko lectured Shuga the half the way about the inconvenience of bison calves. Katara lectured him the other half about letting Shuga make her own choices about bison calves and totally undermined him. As they left the bisons, already making big eyes at each other, Zuko told Katara, "Stop encouraging her."

"How about you stop trying to stop her from being happy," Katara retorted.

There were responses to that, but Zuko was pretty sure they wouldn't win him the argument with Katara. So he let it go and they all trudged down to the arena where the tournament was being held. Letting an eager Aang and Sokka lead the way, they settled into seats at the front. "Hey, front row seats! I wonder why no one else is sitting here," mused Aang.

When a boulder pretty much destroyed a section of the stands only a few feet away, Sokka said, "I guess that's why."

"Shouldn't we move higher up?" Zuko asked.

"We don't wanna miss the action!" protested Sokka.

The master of ceremonies had arrived in a noisy display of earthbending, and shouted, "Welcome to Earth Rumble Six! I am your host, Xin Fu!"

Katara sighed and turned away from the display in annoyance. "This is just gonna be a bunch of guys chucking rocks at each other, isn't it?"

"That's what I paid for!" cheered Sokka.

Zuko, who had wound up next to Sokka promptly stood up and moved to the other side of their little group. "I'm just going to sit here next to someone who's not being stupid," he informed Sokka.

"What are you? A girl?" Sokka mocked before his eyes were drawn back to the arena floor. "Yeah! Woooooo! Go! Go! Go!"

"The 'hippo'?" Zuko asked.

Katara snorted. "He's the 'Big Bad Hippo', don't forget."

"Ah. My mistake," Zuko replied dryly.

They exchanged glances and rolled eyes over the overwrought dialogue. "Do you suppose they rehearse that in advance?" Katara wondered.

"I think it's staged," Zuko said. "At least partly."

When the match was over, Katara turned to Aang. "How about the Boulder? He's got some good moves."

Aang shook his head a little and made a bit of a face. "I don't know. Bumi said I need a teacher who listens to the earth. He's just listening to his big muscles. What do you think guys?" he asked Zuko and Sokka.

Sokka's only reply was bloodthirsty cheering for the pummelling of the Boulder's next opponent.

"I think you should find a teacher who doesn't talk about himself in the third person all the time," Zuko told him.

"A good point," Katara said.

The words, "Fire Nation Man," from the MC caught their attention. Zuko stared, appalled. "Tell me that's not how the rest of the world sees firebenders," he begged Katara and Aang. "I can take people thinking I'm evil. That? Not so much."

"Do you guys really have an anthem?" Katara asked with a sort of horrified fascination.

Zuko nodded miserably. "It was instituted by Fire Lord Sozin."

"Wow. Everything bad in the world really does go back to him," Sokka commented helpfully. "Yeah! Kill that Fire Nation guy!"

"I feel dirty," Zuko informed the other two. Then he turned to Sokka. "Just for that, I hope there's a Water Tribes guy who gets pummelled." He paused. "Actually," he informed Sokka, "There _is_ a Water Tribes guy who's going to get pummelled."

"What? Who . . . If you think you can take me, Lee."

"Oh, stop it," Katara tugged on Zuko's arm. "Let him be an idiot. You know he's just enjoying the loud booms."

After a few more rounds, Zuko commented, "I kind of liked the Gopher. He was pretty squirrely."

Katara nodded. "The way he paddled his arms and legs when the Boulder tossed him around was pretty squirrel-like."

"You're not taking this seriously at all, are you?" Aang asked.

Zuko shrugged. "How could anybody? I think this is probably a total bust Aang." He thought for a moment. "But it might be worthwhile seeing if we could find out where they trained."

Aang perked up at that. "We could go now," he suggested. He was clearly just as disillusioned as Zuko and Katara with the whole mess.

"And ruin Sokka's fun?" Zuko said with a sigh. "We might as well let him get his money's worth. I think he's enjoying it enough for all of us."

Indeed, Sokka seemed to be having the time of his life watching the fighting.

Finally they reached the climax of the evening, the championship round. "Now, the moment you've all been waiting for. The Boulder versus your champion . . . The Blind Bandit!"

For the first time at that idiotic event, Zuko sat bolt upright, staring. There was a girl there, about Aang's age. She had black hair and even from the distance they were from her, it looked like there was actually something wrong with her eyes. She stood there, holding the championship belt over her head, with an easy kind confidence Zuko had only ever associated with the best benders he'd known. Those who knew their element inside and out.

"She can't really be blind," Katara said. "It's just part of her character, right ?"

Aang was staring as much as Zuko and Katara. "I think she is."

"I think she is . . ." Sokka said with a dramatic pause. "Going down!" he shouted. Clearly still totally enamoured of his idol, The Boulder.

Zuko ignored him. "Either this really is staged, or she's . . . something."

She was something else, all right.

After the obligatory yapping, they settled into business. When The Boulder tried to do some foot-stomping move, she stopped it cold with quick subtlety. A simple shift of her foot moved the earth under him, pulling his feet apart into a painful-looking split with perfect timing. Just as his foot hit the earth for whatever he'd intended, it went flying sideways.

"That's _good_," he said. "I almost wouldn't call it earthbending it's so subtle."

"What would you call it then?" Katara asked.

"Huh?" Zuko looked at her briefly before returning his attention to the fight. "I just meant most earthbending is all huge effects and wild gestures. She just twisted a heel, and destroyed his entire attack with one beautiful, simple move. She's amazing."

A simple arm movement sent three spurs of stone out of the ground, knocking The Boulder with perfect force to flatten him against the arena wall. It was fast, it was perfect and Zuko was going to tell Aang to get this girl's teacher to teach him if it was the last thing he did. Sokka was almost sobbing in despair over the ignominious defeat of his icon by a little girl.

"How did she do that?" Katara asked in wonder.

Aang spoke slowly. Almost as if he was feeling his way through the words. "She waited. And listened."

Zuko opened his mouth to tell Aang they had to find out who her teacher was, when the MC bellowed, "To make things a little more interesting, I'm offering up this sack of gold pieces to anyone who can defeat The Blind Bandit!" There was a long pause. "What? No one dares to face her ?"

"I will!" Aang practically chirped as he bounded onto the raised arena floor.

Zuko sighed. "What's wrong with him?" he asked the world at large. "Can't we just find her after the show and ask where she trained?"

"Go Aang! Avenge The Boulder!" screamed Sokka.

Katara and Zuko both turned to stare at him. "Forget Aang," he said with a sigh. "What's wrong with _him_?"

"Don't ask me," said Katara. "I think he gets it from Dad."

Meanwhile, The Blind Bandit was trash talking at Aang, who told her, "I don't really want to fight you. I want to talk to you."

"Boo! No talking!"

Zuko and Katara hit Sokka at the same time from both sides, making him squeak in a very unmanly fashion. "Don't boo him!" added Katara sharply.

"Stop making an idiot of yourself," Zuko told him helpfully.

The back and forth onstage continued, Aang dodging and trying to get the earthbending girl to talk to him, the earthbender determined to take his head off. "Now we see the earthbender in her," Zuko said in dismay. "Really, by now someone sensible would have asked him what he was babbling about. But no. She has to keep on going after him instead."

"You're prejudiced!" Katara said in some surprise, pointing at him accusingly.

Zuko stared at her. "What do you mean?"

"Earthbenders! You're always going on about them whenever we deal with them. You keep saying how they're bullheaded and-"

"And they're proud of it," he said. "It's fundamental earthbender philosophy. You can see it in how they fight. 'I will not be moved an inch by anything.'"

Katara shook her head. "I'm keeping an eye on you," she told him. "The next time you get all snooty about earthbenders for no reason, I'll get you."

"You can try," he said amicably. He was generally aware that he didn't like them, but that was after three years of experience in the Earth Kingdom.

Okay, and maybe there was a little bit of a hangover from his childhood.

Just a little. Not that he'd admit it to her now.

Aang had accidentally sent his opponent off the platform and was given the pot for winning the match. Sokka ran up to accept on Aang's behalf, while the Avatar ran after the girl who stormed off in pique over her loss.

After the mess at the fight, Aang explained the vision he'd had in the swamp, which Zuko thought was a crazy way to pick a teacher, but Aang had his own needs, so he followed along while Katara egged Aang on in his weird spiritual hunt and Sokka . . . acted like a fifteen-year-old noblewoman after a long day of clothes shopping.

"Sokka, stop that," Zuko told him as the other teen started to model the champion belt, comparing it with his new bag for the hundredth time. "You look like a girl," he told his friend, hoping to put a stop to the bizarre behaviour. "And not a sensible one like Katara," he added, pretending he hadn't seen the glare she levelled at him. She smiled in satisfaction.

Sokka wasn't fooled. "Since when are you scared of my sister?"

"Since she developed the ability to impale me when my back was turned at fifty paces?" Zuko suggested.

She was also intimidating to Tufty and his buddy, who mentioned the Bei Fong family as having a winged boar as the family symbol, so off they went to accost the local nobility about a daughter they didn't have. Or maybe not.

"Why are we breaking in?" Zuko asked. "Couldn't we look around a little first before risking a confrontation with guards?"

He was roundly ignored, even by Sokka who was normally the other party in these requests for sanity. So they all went in, and that little wretch set them up, faking weakness just like his sister used to when she was six and wanted to make him look bad. First chance he got, he was going to box her ears.

He said as much to Katara who promptly told him violence solved nothing.

"_You're_ saying that violence solves nothing?" Sokka asked her. "You hit me all the time!"

"And it doesn't solve anything, does it?" she said smartly back.

Zuko blinked. "How is it she has a point?"

Aang said faithfully, "She's right. Violence is never the answer."

Sokka and Zuko shared a look of exasperation at the boy crushing on the waterbender, and at this supposed pacifist who had done his own damage to the enemy on their journey. "Shpff," they both said.

The Avatar was particularly determined to get this girl to be his teacher, however, which was how they wound up having a civilised dinner, except for Sokka who was eating like a savage. In response, he had found himself straightening and acting even more properly than before.

"Lee, is it?" asked Lao Bei Fong.

He nodded respectfully. "Yes, sir."

The man smiled slightly. "Might I inquire where you are from, young man? You have a noble bearing."

Zuko manfully ignored the faces his friends were making and treated the exchange as he would any at court back home. "I thank you for the compliment, Nobleman Bei Fong."

"Oh," said the man with a charming smile. "I am no nobleman. Merely a merchant."

Zuko smiled his own charming smile back. "But surely one of much distinction to have had such success."

"You flatter me," said the man. "I am sure one who is so comfortable among the nobles must have a background of some distinction, however."

Zuko sighed, and said, carefully, "I am sorry I must refrain from speaking of such matters in too great detail, but as I travel with the Avatar I prefer to keep my background a secret from most lest my family be placed in some . . . difficulty due to enemies of the Avatar."

"Of course, of course," Bei Fong said in a conciliatory manner. "A young man of your stature must be in great demand at home, however. The creation of alliances being what it is."

Committing a solecism in the world of subtle political manoeuvring, Zuko said, "I'm afraid I don't quite follow, Gentleman Bei Fong."

Bei Fong made a quick gesture to a servant behind him. "I wish you to understand that my family is quite wealthy, so I am more than capable of paying what is necessary in a dowry, nor do I need any great bride price."

The girl from the ring, the one who had almost gotten them caught by the guards, the one with the obnoxious choice of pretending she was helpless just to mess with them came out looking frail and helpless in her delicate gown. "I . . ." Zuko trailed off. He wasn't suggesting . . .

"May I present my daughter, Toph Bei Fong, Nobleman Lee?" Lao Bei Fong said. He added softly, "Toph, bow to Nobleman Lee."

She made her bow, not an iota out of place for one of her rank bowing to someone of the rank he was playing. "My pleasure to meet you."

Bei Fong introduced them all to her, and she made her obeisances, saying the meaningless pleasantries one did at such occasions. Bei Fong then turned to Zuko. "I realise this is most abrupt, but as you can see, Toph is . . . crippled by blindness." Zuko caught the slight spasming of the girl's hands as this was said. He felt a sudden sense of charity for her, if she was capable of such bending as they'd seen the night before, but was still treated like a helpless baby. Bei Fong continued, having missed the brief movement. "I have often worried about finding someone to care for her, as she cannot search for a husband on her own, and many would not agree to marry a girl with her . . . deficiencies."

"I . . . see," Zuko said, noncommittally. He really was going to outright suggest it.

"I can tell you are a man of honour," Bei Fong told him. "You would not accompany the Avatar, otherwise, and your noble breeding shows in your manner of speech and your carriage."

_Meaning I act like a nobleman, which any monkey can be trained to do._ Zuko glanced at Sokka. _Almost any monkey._

He kept his face expressionless and Lao said, "So I would ask that you consider taking the hand of my daughter in marriage once she is of age. I can assure you that the allegiance would be most profitable for both sides of the arrangement."

Zuko was about to say something, anything, to dissuade the man from his course of marrying Toph to him, when he felt something warm, wet, a little slimy and somewhat chunky hit his head from behind, accompanied by the distinct sounds of shock in Sokka's voice.

"Sokka!" exclaimed Katara, sounding particularly horrified.

Pained, yet grateful that Sokka's shock had won him this escape, Zuko said. "Gentleman Lao, I must ask that you excuse me to your washroom." The man hastily nodded and Zuko hissed at Sokka as he passed him, "You had to _spit_ on me?"

"I was surprised!" Sokka hissed back.

Zuko left the room, and was pleasantly surprised by the servant who was delegated to follow him. For a brief moment he was brought back to his life of privilege in the palace where he grew up, and the servant who, as this man did, helped him out of his clothing, assisted him in washing and replaced his food-spattered clothing quickly and efficiently with similar, but better made, items from the stores available in their host's home. It was nice to enjoy those comforts again, however briefly.

He closed his eyes a moment, relaxing as a second servant, this one a young woman, arrived. The motions were all so similar and he'd missed the life that was so familiar to him, that he let them move him about; fixing his still-wet hair into a traditional Earth Kingdom style, straightening his clothes, which, on second glance were not the travel wear to which he had become accustomed, but the tunic and pants worn under a formal robe.

Soon he was dressed in soft linens and expensive silks, having been assured that his travel clothes would soon be cleaned and returned to him.

He arrived back in the dining room in time to hear the Lady Bei Fong say, in the bright tones of the professional hostess, "Shall we move to the living room for dessert, then?"

Zuko joined the procession, noting the mess on the table, the narrow-eyed looks Aang was shooting at Toph and her own irritated glare straight ahead. He got in close to Sokka, asking, "What'd I miss?"

"She used earthbending to mess with the table, and Aang sneezed and made everything go everywhere . . ." he finally turned to look at Zuko and trailed off. "What happened to you?" he demanded.

Zuko shot him an annoyed look. "You mean after you got your chewed food all over me?"

"You look like . . . a . . . a . . ." Sokka sputtered as he searched for the word.

Katara provided it. "A nobleman? Hmm . . . I wonder . . ." she said. "How that could _ever_ happen? I mean, what with him being a noble and all."

"But the clothes and the hair and the . . . walking," Sokka said, gesturing.

Bei Fong had caught this and said, "Were your companions unaware of your background, Nobleman Lee?"

"They were not," Zuko replied. "But as I am travelling among . . . ordinary people, I try not to stand out." He smiled carefully. If he said the wrong thing now, Katara and Sokka would be offended at him for calling them commoners. Which they were, but . . . and if he implied the wrong thing, Aang would be offended on their behalf for the insult. If he went too far the other way, Bei Fong was likely to be offended at negative implications regarding the upper classes.

How he hated walking fine lines.

He sighed and said. "I need to thank you, Gentleman Bei Fong. You were most generous with the services of your servants." Zuko bowed, and added, "It has been a long time since I enjoyed the use of body servants of that kind."

"Your . . . companions do not provide such assistance?" the man asked.

Shooting him a warning look, Zuko replied sharply. "I would not ask such of them any more than you would ask a member of the king's personal guard to perform such a task."

Bei Fong nodded gracefully, allowing the rebuke. Conversation continued cautiously from that point, and Zuko let it flow around him, almost comfortingly. He realised with a small jolt that he missed living in civilised conditions for more than just the silken sheets and luxurious lifestyle. He missed the talk of art and culture that went on at upper class tables. He missed discussing the war in ways that were on a broader scale than merely how badly torched one place or another had been. He and Bei Fong discussed musical and stage performances they had both seen, how the war was affecting tradesmen's livelihoods and the availability of luxuries from other nations. They discussed policies of the kings in the Earth Kingdom and their wisdom or lack thereof in terms of the welfare of the population and the growth of economies.

Zuko was the Fire Lord's son. He'd cut his teeth on that sort of talk and he missed hearing it and he missed the bigger picture it gave a person of what the war was doing. Understanding how bad it was for the individuals involved was important, but decisions also had to be made on the understanding of how it was going to affect many people.

Aang listened, wide-eyed, to the discussion. Zuko doubted he had ever considered there was more to the conflict than the soldiers attacking people and some people fighting back. Sokka looked bored and Katara looked . . .

Fascinated.

Slowly she began to ask questions as they spoke. Questions about trade, about how the merchants were working around the battles being waged, the trade that continued with the Fire Nation despite the war and edicts from both governments against it, what the broader scope of the conflict looked like.

For a brief moment, Zuko had a flash of what she could be in politics. Saw her as an ambassador, minister, or the power behind a throne. When the party broke up and they went to the guest wing, where several rooms had been laid aside for them, he told her, "Not bad."

"Huh?" she asked.

Zuko laughed a little. "Not bad for someone who's not used to policy talk," he explained. "You knew the right questions to ask and you made a few really good points."

"You really seemed to be enjoying yourself," she observed.

"I was," he said, still a little surprised. "It's hard to remember when you're actually on the ground that there are bigger things going on than just what you're doing." He gave her a sheepish smile. "I like seeing the bigger picture."

"Boring!" yawned Sokka as he flopped onto a sofa. "Is that all rich people talk about?"

"Says the guy who spent days talking about rotten eggs," Katara sniped back.

Aang piped up, "I think it's good to see both sides," he said. "The actual people, and how the war is affecting everyone everywhere." He went to the window then, telling Appa goodnight.

Before Zuko could do the same with Shuga, Toph showed up. She offered a truce, and she and Aang disappeared through the door to talk. Zuko watched for a moment, before reaching out to pat Shuga on the nose and say, "Goodnight, Shuga. Don't let Appa hog the good hay."

She rumbled and nuzzled back the way he'd trained her to when he was dressed in his nice clothes. He came back in and sat down, absently sweeping the robes into the graceful configuration he'd been trained to ever since he was small. Sokka was looking at him quizzically when he got back. "You didn't seem all that surprised when Bei Fong tried to get you to marry his daughter," he said bluntly.

Zuko shrugged. "I was and I wasn't," he replied. "I hadn't been expecting it, but considering that Toph is blind and Bei Fong is just a merchant, I'm not surprised. She'll never make an advantageous match on her own. Too many parents would be concerned about her passing her blindness on to any children she had."

"You mean he's trying to set her up for _money_?" Katara gasped in outrage.

"Oh, not just money," Zuko told her. "Prestige, power, the chance to offload a burden onto someone else."

"A burden," Sokka said in surprise.

Zuko nodded. "He may love her, I don't know. What I do know is that she's blind, so she can't read, which would make her a poor choice to run a business unless she's naturally good at it. He feels she's helpless and will rely on him for everything. If he's doing this because he cares, he's making sure she'll be well-looked after, if he doesn't, he's making sure that at least she'll get him something out of her general lack of use."

"That's cold," Sokka said in disgust.

Zuko snorted. "You think even _I_ would be exempt from that? Royalty-" he hastily changed what he was going to say before he gave himself away, "And nobility both use their children as chattel. We're good negotiating pieces," he said.

"What about . . . well . . . love?" Katara asked, hesitantly.

He gave her a shrug that was trying to be careless. "What's love got to do with marriage?" he asked, rhetorically. "I don't think I've ever met anyone who married for love."

"Oh, Lee," Katara said and started toward him. Before she could say or do anything, there was a knock at the door, and a servant entered with his freshly washed and pressed clothing. He took it with a thank you and hurried out of sight to change once the man had gone.

When he came back out, feeling less like his old self, the prince, and more like Lee again, there was a sudden commotion in the garden, then silence.

The entire household hurried out to find that Toph and Aang had been kidnapped by the Earth Rumble's MC and The Boulder. They quickly made plans to deliver the ransom, while Sokka enthused over having The Boulder's autograph. When he did it one too many times, Katara slapped him. "Thank you," Zuko told her.

In the end, Toph pretty much destroyed the entire cast of the Earth Rumble singlehanded. It was an impressive sight. Made even more impressive when he realised she had somehow taught herself how to do it. Internally he sighed. Was he always to be surrounded by prodigies? Lao Bei Fong also proved himself to be as traditional as Zuko had thought, when he ordered that Toph be placed under effective house arrest.

He was still grinning in amusement over her cheap shot on Aang, her demand that Sokka return the belt, and the fact that she wound up taking hit by the thing to her head, when she insisted she would travel with him. She settled in next to him, and said, "So who are you really?"

"What?" He turned to her, startled.

She shrugged. "You were lying to my Dad about something. I'm not sure what; just that it has to do with your, 'noble background'."

"How did you know?" he asked. Then his eyes narrowed suspiciously. "This is one of your earthbending things, isn't it?"

"Yup," she told him. "And you're avoiding my question."

"And I'll keep doing it until I want to answer it," he told her. "I'll tell you what the others know and that's all."

"Fine," she said. "But I can tell if you're lying." Then Toph paused and added, "By the way, if it came down to it, I wouldn't mind marrying you."

"Oh?" Zuko asked in surprise. "How come?"

"I heard you telling the other two about love and marriage in the upper classes," she explained. "I think . . . I think we'd get along if it came down to it."

He grinned, and said, "You do realise that Sokka's a savage, Aang's an optimist and Katara's just crazy?"

"Eh," she said and flopped down to pick at her bare feet with her fingernails. "I'm not all that civilised either. I just pretended with my parents."

Watching her prod at some pretty disgusting things caught between her toes, Zuko gagged and said, "I can believe it." So she threw something unidentifiable, but icky, at his head, and Zuko hastily told Shuga to keep following Appa while he and Toph wrestled for dominance in the saddle. He learned something very important while they did that.

Toph, without her earthbending, was a hair-puller.


	6. Zuko, Wounded

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: I present to you . . . something that doesn't connect with any episodes in the original series at all. I hope you enjoy, because I had no template to work off of for this, and . . . well . . . I know a lot of you have been waiting for this chapter.

* * *

They had flown for part of the day just to get some distance between them and Gaoling. Their original plan, to head straight for Ba Sing Se in search of an earthbending master for Aang, was no longer necessary. So they simply flew a while, Zuko letting Aang lead wherever he wanted. There was no reason to go anywhere in particular, though they were trying to find a good, remote valley where Toph could begin teaching Aang earthbending in safety.

However, Toph, unused to the flying, and doubly upset by it as the means of travel rendered her truly blind, without even her earth-sight to compensate, meant Zuko gestured them all down to a landing far sooner than otherwise.

"Is something wrong?" Katara asked the moment they touched down.

Zuko showed Toph how to use Shuga's tail as a ramp, replying, "Toph was getting a little airsick. I suspect earthbenders aren't so much intended for flight as the rest of us. I'm sure she'll get a little better at it with time. But I thought it was better to get her used to flying slowly rather than messing with her. Now that we have an earthbending teacher for Aang, we can afford to relax a little."

"Okay," Katara said. "There's a village just on the other side of the hill, there. We'll go and get some supplies."

She went to tell Sokka and Aang what Zuko had said. He immediately turned to Toph. "Sorry. It was the only thing I could think of that would let us land early."

"It's okay," Toph told him. "Ah, sweet, sweet land! I missed you." Then she flopped onto her back and seemed to sink an inch into the ground. A moment later Zuko realised it was because she really _had_ sunk an inch into the ground.

"That is really disturbing," he told her.

She wasn't listening. She'd stopped and put her ear to the ground, both her hands splayed out, and said, "There's someone down there."

"What?" Zuko asked. "Down there how? Passages, or buried?" He looked up to wave the others over, but they'd already left on Appa for the village.

Toph frowned. "Passages." She looked up at Zuko. "You told me about those airbender enclave things. Do you think this could be one?"

Zuko blinked. "Could be. Ours were in volcanic tunnels in Cheng Dhu."

"Neat," Toph told him. She frowned. "Let me just . . ." she spread her arms and twisted her legs, starting to create an opening below her.

"Wait!" Zuko said. "Not that I don't want to look right away, but if they're an enclave, they'd be really unhappy if you just opened a hole straight inside."

Toph gave him an irritated look. "Then what do you want to do?" she demanded.

"Maybe you could tell if there's an entrance nearby?" he asked. "There should be a bigger area, since they would need somewhere for the bisons, too."

The little earthbender nodded. "Okay. Let's see what there is," she said, and closed her eyes in concentration. It was the work of a few moments for her to say, "There's a tunnel not far over that way." She pointed west and started walking. Zuko followed her, looking for entrance markers. Shuga followed after them both. They reached something that looked like a solid cliff, and Toph stopped, pointing at a boulder that appeared to have broken off the top some time ago and lodged against it. "Right there."

Zuko frowned. "Not that I'm doubting you, but can you give me a minute to see-" Clearly out of patience with him, she gestured sharply again, and he watched as the boulder receded into the cliff face, revealing a cleanly cut tunnel in the stone. "You'd better not have damaged the mechanism," he told her.

"Relax, Sparky," she told him. "It's working fine."

"It better, or I'm siccing them all on you," he said. "Brat."

"Wimp."

"Mule-ox."

"And proud of it," she said, marching forward.

He turned to Shuga. "We'll be back soon." She rumbled an acknowledgement and settled down in a comfortable sprawl. Then he followed Toph down. The little earthbender unerringly led him through the tunnels, with none of the false starts and hard work he'd had to do at the North Pole. As they went, he noted the small signs, scratched into the walls here and there. This was definitely an airbender enclave.

They reached the last turn, then Toph held out a hand and opened the hidden entrance, leading them both into the final tunnel that opened into a large open space. As in his enclave and in the one at the North Pole, there were playing children, airbenders and bisons everywhere. It was completely enclosed on all four sides. However, the sides went straight up for an incredible distance. It was as though someone had bored an enormous hole straight down from a mountaintop until it reached the same level as the floor of the valley next to it. At the very top, he could see the sky. Toph nodded, impressed. "It used to be a volcano, I can feel the different kind of rocks."

"Different kinds of rocks," said a voice behind him. "I should have expected you to do something like this."

Zuko turned around, feeling his heart pound. "Mother," he said. "I-"

She cut him off. "That's it?" she demanded.

He suppressed the desire to reach for her. She was his mother and he loved her, but he couldn't. Instead, he sank into the deep bow formal occasions required of a prince to the Fire Lady. "My Lady," he said. "I must present to you, Toph Bei Fong. The earthbending teacher to the Avatar."

Lady Ursa sneered. "Really? I am expected to believe this? I raised you better than to fall for the bragging of some guttersnipe earthbender about the insane rumours circulating about the return of the Avatar. But what else can I expect from a _firebender_." He flinched. As he was meant to. As he always did.

Toph reacted, where he froze. With a skillful slide of one foot, Zuko saw his mother buried up to her neck in gravel and dirt. "You don't get to talk to him that way," she informed the woman. "Here I thought I was the only one with parents who didn't care about me because of something I couldn't help."

"Toph," Zuko tried to reason with her. "Look. I know it sounds bad, but she just-"

"She just told you that you're worthless because you're a firebender. Just like my dad kept saying I was useless because I'm blind," Toph snapped.

They had talked while they were on Shuga, and he'd told her the things the others knew, or had assumed about him. She'd told him about growing up blind and teaching herself how to bend by copying badger moles. Zuko knew he'd already carved out a place for her in his slowly growing family of friends, just as he had with Aang, Sokka and Katara. It was gratifying to know she'd done the same.

Toph wasn't finished though. "I know you understood. That's why I said what I said about being okay with my dad's proposal that you marry me for the alliance."

A sudden blast of air behind them showered them both with the dirt and gravel that had been holding his mother captive. They turned and Lady Ursa gave a snort of laughter. "Someone wanted to marry you off to _him_?" She shook her head. "Will wonders never cease."

Another voice came out of the dark then, startling both Zuko and Ursa, though Toph was clearly unsurprised. "Ursa. Who is this?"

His mother turned to the woman approaching from another tunnel. "Oh. This is . . . Lee," she said. "My son." Then she said, "And an earthbender he brought in here for reasons that entirely escape me."

Eyes narrowed in anger, Toph said, "He didn't bring me, I brought him. I sensed there were tunnels and I wanted to see what was there. He tried to stop me."

"Of course he did," Ursa said, condescendingly. "My son was never that competent, was he? Unable to stop a little girl."

Every word made his heart hurt more. She used to take some care not to go to far in front of others, but he supposed she felt it wasn't worth it any more. He closed his eyes, searching for enough inner calm to keep from embarrassing himself. He was startled then, when the other woman said, "Ursa! That is enough."

"I beg your pardon, Ling?"

"The boy is your son whom you haven't seen since you were driven from your enclave and all you can do is treat him like dirt?" the other woman demanded. "You're treating him the same was you treat our earthbenders."

Ursa pulled herself upright. "I gave up everything to marry the monster I did, and produce two," she sneered yet again, "_Firebending_ children for him just so that I could protect my people." As she took a deep breath to continue, Zuko braced himself for a lecture he'd heard often. The airbenders in Cheng Dhu had been under the impression Ursa had four children. Aiko, Zuko's older sister, Lee, Fire Prince Zuko and Fire Princess Azula. She had often made this speech, and it usually won her whatever concessions she wanted made. It didn't work this time.

"Well, I can't wonder that the two firebending ones turned out badly if you treated them the way you treat the earthbenders in our enclave," Ling interrupted tartly. "As you seem to be treating this poor boy. He looks about ready to cry."

"Sparky's not gonna cry," Toph assured her. "He's too manly for that. Now that Sokka boy . . ." she trailed off meaningfully.

Ling turned fully to Toph and said, "Sokka? That's the name of one of the Avatar's companions."

"That's because we're travelling with him," Zuko told Ling. "Toph just joined us. She's to teach him earthbending while Water Master Katara teaches him waterbending."

Ling nodded sharply. "That settles it. I was going to take the news of the Avatar to the council of elders, to see if we should invite him into the enclave." She smiled at Zuko. "The son of one our members travels with the last airbending master. We must make the Avatar and his party welcome."

Faintly Zuko smiled back.

Toph broke in. "Well, if there are earthbenders in here, then maybe I can chat with a few of 'em. Get some ideas about how to start training The Fancy Dancer."

Reaching for a sense of equilibrium, Zuko said, "Really? Don't you think using your heckling from the Earth Rumble is a little silly in the real world . . . Blind Bandit?"

"Good point," Toph said. "I'll have to think of something really good," she declared. "You coming?"

"If it's okay with you, Ling," Zuko said, "I'd like to head back out, and then my bison and I can lead the Avatar, his friends and bison in. I assume you use the opening above as your entrance?" he asked.

Ling nodded, ignoring the sound of disgust made by Ursa as she did. As he left, heading back the way he and Toph had come, Zuko heard Ling saying, "That rigmarole about giving up your life for the good of the enclave may have worked for you in the Fire Nation, but here you're just another airbender, Ursa. If you don't stop putting on airs, someone's going to do something, skilled bender or no. Your teaching is prejudiced and I will not have a quarter of our enclave being alienated just because you don't like earthbenders."

At that point he moved out of earshot, feeling quite shaken. He'd never heard anyone speak to his mother that way, save his father. But Fire Lord Ozai was a cruel despot, and Ursa had always made him well aware of the respect she was due for her sacrifices and her rank.

He made it back outside, and found Shuga waiting. He immediately wrapped his arms around her neck. "Mother's inside, Shuga," he said to his bison. He heard her make her comforting rumbly noise and clung a little tighter. After a few moments, he relaxed and said, "We have to go back to where we landed and wait for the others. We've been invited to bring Aang into the enclave."

By the time they'd walked back, Appa had returned with the others. "Hey, Lee!" Aang waved as he hopped down. "Where were you? And where's Toph?"

"Inside the enclave," Zuko said.

The other three perked up. "There's another enclave here?" Sokka asked.

"Yeah," Zuko said. "Toph just felt the people in the tunnels, then bulled her way in. I can lead you to the bisons' entrance."

Aang smiled. "That would be great, Lee." As he, Katara and Sokka collected the things they'd unpacked for the night, the airbender added, "When Katara and Sokka said there weren't any airbenders left I felt alone, you know. Even if they're not the way they were, the fact that they're still here, in some form is just great. I never would have known if I hadn't met you, Lee."

It was balm on the wounds his mother had just opened, this open thanks and appreciation. Zuko took it. Sokka joined him on Shuga and they took off. Once they were in the air, Sokka said, "Okay, now that they can't hear us, what's wrong?"

"What do you mean?" Zuko asked.

Sokka just raised an eyebrow at him. "I know you, Lee. Something's upset you. You have that, 'I think I'm a bad person for no reason,' look."

"I don't-" Zuko protested.

Sokka spoke over his protest. "Yes, you do. What's set it off this time."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'll get it out of you eventually," Sokka told him.

They flew the rest of the way in silence, Zuko leading them to the peak with the opening, spiralling down to land in the open bowl at the bottom. Once they were off, and the saddles off the bisons, Shuga snuggled into Appa's side, glaring at any other female bison that came their way. Zuko gave her two parting words. "No calves."

"I see you still talk to that runt like she's your only friend," his mother said from behind him.

Katara, Sokka and Aang whipped around to look at the woman. Appa snarled. "And who are you?" Sokka demanded.

"This is my mother, Lady Ursa," Zuko said. "Mother, this is Master Waterbender Katara, her brother, a warrior of the Southern Water Tribes, Sokka, and the Avatar, Aang."

Katara, ever friendly, stepped forward holding out a hand in greeting, "It's nice to meet you," she said with a smile. "I'm glad to finally meet Lee's mother."

"A pleasure," his mother said with the false smiled that stated she was displeased with the meeting. Katara faltered.

Before things could become ugly, Ling arrived, Toph in tow, to bring them to meet the enclave's elders. They followed the airbender, leaving Ursa behind. "Pleasant woman, your mother," Sokka said dryly.

"She's had a hard life," Zuko protested weakly.

"Yeah," said Toph. "So hard she started off by telling you you're an incompetent moron right off."

He had to explain. They weren't understanding the situation. It was his fault. He was the one who'd never been good enough. "She didn't mean it like that. She was just . . . concerned. I mean, she's always had to protect the Cheng Dhu enclave, so it's right that she's protective. She was just scolding me. I mean, there were only rumours about the Avatar, right?"

The others exchanged looks, but he couldn't interpret them. Was it pity?

"Lee . . ." Sokka put a hand on his shoulder, as if to comfort him.

"I'm fine," he said, pulling away. He _was_ fine. She had every right to criticise. Azula was crazy, she always had been, and he just hadn't been . . . good enough. It was just coincidence that his oldest sister was named something that meant 'beloved', while he just had . . . a name. After all, Azula had been named by his father, so her being special enough to be named after their grandfather was just his father's perspective. So the fact that no one cared enough to name him something . . . more was just . . . coincidence.

Silence settled over the small group for a moment. Then Ling, in the lead, said, "I know she's your mother, Lee, but you shouldn't take everything she says to heart. She's not as important as she thinks she is."

He refused to answer and brooded quietly through the meeting with the elders. Aang agreed to teach a few master classes to the airbenders there, while Katara was given the opportunity to refill their supplies from the enclave ones free of charge. Sokka and Zuko took the opportunity to requisition items to repair the bison saddles, and get Shuga and Appa looked over by the enclave's animal healer. They would stay for a few days before continuing their trip. When Aang asked eagerly for the locations of other enclaves, he was told, regretfully, that they only knew the general locations of the other enclaves, and that a person had to find his or her way in on their own. It was a failsafe in case someone was caught by the Fire Nation and tortured, the most they could reveal was, "There's an enclave somewhere around Ba Sing Se."

They got settled in as guests of various air and earthbenders in the area, and Zuko found himself staying with his mother. They ate dinner in an oppressive silence. He couldn't stand it any more, when he finally asked, "Where's Aiko, mother?"

She shot him an angry look. "So you finally bothered to ask? As if you care about your sister," she sneered. "All I know is that she wound up at the Ba Sing Se enclave."

"So she's alright, then," Zuko said in relief. "I'm glad to hear it."

"No thanks to you," she snapped. "I still cannot believe you protected the monsters who destroyed our people."

"I-"

Ursa was glaring at him. "I don't want to hear any excuses from you," she interrupted. "Because you had to protect _firebenders_-"

"It was a nonbending unit!" Zuko pleaded. "They were new recruits. Under eighteen, all of them."

She ignored him. "Thanks to _your_ need to protect the enemy, our enclave and Cheng Dhu were victim to a burnout."

Zuko trembled. If he hadn't failed, if he had just kept his mouth shut, he could have redirected the orders. There wouldn't have been a burnout. There was a knock at the door, and Zuko went to his bedroll in the kitchen. If he could just have a minute of peace he wouldn't shame himself in front of her.

Sokka's voice rang through the house. "Where's Lee? I wanted him to stick with me," he said. Zuko heard his mother protesting, and Sokka ignoring her and marching into the house in search of him. "Are you okay? You look as white as a sheet."

"He's fine," snapped Ursa.

"Come on," Sokka said, pulling Zuko up. "Let's take you to see Katara."

"I . . . We shouldn't bother her," Zuko said.

"Yes," Sokka told him in no uncertain terms. "We should."

Zuko was pulled down the street, and found himself being pulled into Ling's home, where Katara and Aang were staying. Toph was there as well, and all three exclaimed on seeing him about how ill he looked. Katara sat him down, and was soon using her water to check him over, while Toph declared that something was clearly wrong with him, his heart was beating so fast.

When someone started pounding on the door, Ling opened it to reveal Ursa. The former Fire Lady marched in and said, "I expect my son to return at once."

"As soon as I'm done checking him over," Katara said absently. "He's clammy and he's cooler to the touch than he ought to be, he's pale and Toph says his heartbeat is too fast. When I'm sure he'll be okay he can go back."

"Now," demanded Ursa. "He can fake illness as well in my home as he can here."

"Fake?" Katara asked, dangerously, her head coming up to glare at the woman.

Ursa smiled. "Yes, fake. I don't expect you realise this, but he is something of an inveterate liar," she told them. "Why, he sent me a letter declaring his father had scarred his face terribly. I could certainly believe it, given that firebenders are savages, but there isn't a mark on him."

Eyes snapping with a blue fire as dangerous as Azula's, Katara said, "He _had_ a scar. It covered the whole side of his face, disfigured his ear and affected his vision and his hearing. After Admiral Zhao _burned your son's face off_, I was granted the power by the Spirit Oasis at the North Pole to heal his face completely."

Ursa blinked. "Oh," she said. "The scar was real?"

"Yes, it was real," Sokka ground out.

"What was he doing that got him into a fight with Zhao?" his mother asked.

Aang stood proudly and said, "Defending me while I was in the Spirit World trying to find a way to keep the Northern Water Tribe from being invaded."

"Really," Ursa said contemplatively. She turned to Zuko. "It's good to know that you're trying to overcome the bad blood from your father."

Sokka snapped. "Just because his father's a firebender and high up in the Fire Nation doesn't mean Lee's a bad person. It just means he has bad luck in a parent."

Zuko pleaded, "Sokka, don't."

"High up?" his mother said. "You have no idea, do you?" she continued. "You have no idea who he really is."

"Mother," Zuko pleaded.

Her eyes narrowed at him. "You've been taking advantage of these poor, foolish, naive children." She turned to his friends. "'Lee' is not who you think he is. 'Lee' is actually the Crown Prince, Zuko. The son of the Fire Lord, Ozai."

Silence met the statement. Zuko wanted to look up. Wanted to plead with his friends to understand. They'd understood before, but this was different. It wasn't just bending, it was . . . he was the enemy. He was the son of the Fire Lord. The one who was supposed to be a spitting image of his father.

"She's telling the truth," Toph said. "I can feel her heartbeat and she's not lying." Then her voice changed. "Not that I care, lady," she said to Ursa. "Sparky's a nice guy and I like him."

Zuko looked up and saw his friends, staring in disgust. Not at him, but at his mother. "I can't believe you," Aang said. "He's your _son_. How can you hate him so much?"

Katara was moving and had wrapped herself around him as Sokka spoke. She murmured in his ear, "It's okay. I understand. I would have hidden it too. It doesn't mean you're a bad person." Zuko couldn't speak. He just leaned into her.

Sokka wasn't nearly as restrained. "You evil woman," he said. "I can't believe this. I knew he hated himself, but I never thought he'd gotten those ideas in his head because you'd just out and out told him he was evil. Sure I knew you had to be horrible to him but this . . ." he shook his head in disbelief. "He's your _family_."

"He's not _family_," Ursa replied, honestly baffled. "He's a firebender."

She'd never said it before. Not like that.

"Get out of my house," Ling told her. "You're going to get out, and tomorrow I'm going to make sure you're never allowed to teach the children again. That boy is your son!" A blast of wind from her sent Ursa tumbling through the door and into the street. Ling turned to them. "If you'll pardon me," she said. "I'll leave you all to help Lee."

She left after Ursa and Zuko said, hesitantly, unbelieving. "You're still here."

"Where else would we be?" Katara asked him. "You're our friend. I can see why you hid who you are, it's big, but . . ." she smiled at him. "You've proved you're our friend. We won't turn our backs on you."

"Yeah," Toph said. She climbed up onto Zuko's other side and joined Katara in hugging him, wiping her dirty feet all over his pants. "Dad's gonna be really miffed he didn't suck up to a prince more than he did."

"Stop getting your dirty feet on my clothes," he told Toph. He had to speak carefully to keep his wildly rocketing emotions from getting the better of him, but just saying it, like everything was normal made him feel better.

Sokka stepped in and knelt in front of Zuko. "So this is the last secret, huh?"

"Yeah," Zuko said. "It is. I just . . . How do you tell people your father wants to take over the world?"

"Just a sec . . ." Sokka said. "That general. The one who helped us. That's the uncle you're worried about."

Not at all sure what Sokka was going to say, whether an accusation about Zuko turning on his own family or a condemnation of his relative, Zuko just nodded.

Katara said, sounding confused, "You practically tried to get him executed."

Were they going to reject him now? "You don't understand," he said. "He once swore he would never go to war again. Not after Lu Ten died at Ba Sing Se. And then he was _there_, on Zhao's ship. I . . . I didn't know what to do and I had to protect the enclave from a burnout. I just . . . I didn't know what to do!" He was looking pleadingly at them. "He got out, I know that because he found me right before we left." He looked at the floor in front of him. "I don't know why, but he said he was proud of me," he said softly.

Ling had come in the door unnoticed. "Perhaps it's because you are a fine young man who deserved none of the guilt laid on you?" she suggested.

"But-"

"No." She held up a finger to silence him. "Your mother may have been allowed to do many things due to her rank in the Fire Nation. That rank means nothing here, and I will make certain she is not allowed to speak ill of you behind your back." Then she turned to the others. "Wounds such as the ones given to him by his parents will not heal quickly or easily."

"M'not _wounded_," Zuko muttered rebelliously. "She never laid a finger on me." When the others looked at him, incredulous, he said defensively. "Okay, that one time when she wanted to prove I wasn't any good as an airbender-"

With a cry of frustration, Sokka went storming off cursing. The sound of someone repeatedly hitting something wood with something metal came from behind the house. Toph bonked him on the head, none too gently. "For someone who's not an airbender, I think you're pretty good at it," she told him.

"You've never even seen me fake airbend," he told her. "So to speak," he added.

Aang rolled his eyes. "The fact that you had _me_ fooled into thinking you were an airbender shows that you're really good at it," said Aang. "You _made_ yourself from a firebender into an airbender by force of will, L . . ." he suddenly stopped. "That's not your real name, is it?"

"You are Crown Prince Zuko," Ling spoke up. "Correct?"

"Yes," he said.

Katara shook her head. "Wow. It's just hard to believe I'm travelling with the Avatar _and_ a prince."

"I'm not-"

The waterbender poked him in the ribs. "If you say anything bad about yourself right now, I'm revoking tiger-seal privileges. You got that?" She hadn't stopped holding him the whole time, and with Toph snuggled against him on one side and Katara wrapped around him from the other, he felt cared for in ways he couldn't have imagined before meeting them.

"Where's your friend gone off to?" Ling asked suddenly, straightening.

That was when they realised Sokka was no longer out back. He didn't return for several hours, and when he did, he looked inordinately pleased with himself. They found out the next day that he had spoken to Appa and Shuga, who had clearly communicated with the other bisons, to harass Ursa however they could.

Shuga was more blatant than that, following her best human friend's mother around and growling at her. The first time he tried to stop her, Sokka arranged to run interference so that Zuko couldn't have any contact with his mother.

When they left, three days later, Zuko had never felt so free. His friends knew everything about him and they still cared about him. They'd met his mother and taken his side against her. He was leaning against Shuga, just telling her about everything when he heard the scrape of boots on the ground behind him. "Zuko?"

He hadn't heard his own name in so long, it sounded odd to him now. "Yeah, Sokka?"

"Y'know, it fits you better."

He frowned. "What does?"

His friend joined him in leaning against his bison. "The name, 'Zuko'. Now that I know, it really fits you better. Lee's too . . . common."

Zuko flinched.

"Not in a bad way," Sokka said, pretending not to have seen it. "Just . . . you're not the same as other people and you shouldn't have the same name as a million other guys." He shot an irritated look at him. "And don't sit there thinking I mean it in a bad way. You know perfectly well I don't."

"Okay," Zuko said. "Thanks, Sokka."

"No problem. Now stop making me have to be girly about this stuff," groused his friend. "I wanna go back to being able to threaten to pummel you without Katara looking at me like I was beating a sack of baby rabbaroos against a stone wall."

Amused, Zuko said, "Yeah, 'cause threatening's all you can do, Water Tribe. You and I both know you couldn't pummel me if your boomerang depended on it."

"What? So we're just ignoring the last three matches-"

"It doesn't count because you stuck an apple down my shirt to get Momo to attack me."

"That was one time!"

"It's still cheating."

"I'll show you cheating!"

Katara made disgusted noises at both of them when they showed up for lunch sweaty, dirty and bruised and dragged them both outside, forcibly washing them from the rainwater barrel with her waterbending. Zuko had similar conversations to the one with Sokka with all his friends, but Katara's stuck out the most.

"L- Zuko?"

"Still getting used to that?" He asked her, smiling.

She smiled ruefully. "Yeah. I just wanted to let you know. I'm really sorry I didn't believe you when you said your mom hated you. I just . . . couldn't believe it."

"I'm just not what she wanted," Zuko said sadly.

"Then she's dumb," Katara declared. "You're nice and sweet and a great fighter and an incredible bender and she doesn't deserve you." Before he could reply, she hugged him tightly. Zuko decided not to fight the moment and relaxed against her, holding her just as tightly. When they finally pulled away, Katara tried to press a kiss to his cheek, missed her aim and hit the corner of his mouth. Some instinct made him turn a little, making it into a proper kiss. When it ended, they were both blushing.

"Sorry," they both blurted at each other, then started laughing as the moment that could have been was broken.

When they left the enclave behind, his mother didn't come out to see him off. Somehow, it didn't hurt like it should have, and Zuko was able to let everything go back to normal. That is, arguing with Sokka about who'd managed to flirt with more pretty girls over the course of their trip.

Obviously it was him.


	7. The Chase

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: There will be no writing at all for me for the next five days, so I expect you all to act like reasonable human beings and not demand any updates for that period plus one day. After that, feel free to demand importunately for updates again. Also, I really really pushed myself to get this one done before leaving tomorrow, so if it's flawed, well, that's why. On another note, yes, I seem to be canon-suing Zuko a little, but I plan to roll that back at some point. Hope you enjoy, and on with the show!

* * *

After many hours of flying, they had finally started getting to the remote and rocky regions that would be the right place for Aang to train his earthbending without interruption, and in relative peace. Reluctantly, Zuko was starting to plan how to approach the Avatar about his firebending as well.

He had been putting off the conversation for a while, ever since Katara had informed him, right after he rejoined them following those happy weeks learning from Jeong Jeong, that Aang had declared he would never firebend again. It didn't really matter until the kid had learned water and earthbending, but now that he was about to start earth, Zuko knew he had to start getting on Aang's case about fire. Shuga made the third protesting noise of the last hour, and so Zuko turned back to Toph and told her sharply. "It's bad enough that you're picking that gunk out of your toes, could you please stop throwing it into Shuga's fur? She doesn't like it."

"So you'll brush it out later," she said dismissively.

Zuko's eyes narrowed at the girl. "You either stop, or I make you. You got that?"

"What are you gonna do?" she taunted. "Smack around the defenceless blind girl?"

"You are about as defenceless as a platypus bear," he informed her. "After camp is set up, it's gonna be you, me, and when I win, you're going to stop throwing your foot gunk into Shuga's fur."

The Blind Bandit grinned. "You're on, Sparky. When you lose, you're gonna stop bugging me about your bison's fur and just deal with it."

"Done." A moment later he added, "Brat."

"Nag."

"Delicate flower."

"You're gonna eat those words."

Not much later they landed. As everyone started getting their things off the bisons, Zuko saw Toph wander around a little, smiling, and he asked, "What's up?"

"Just taking in the scenery," she said. "It's just . . . the earth here is different than at home and I can feel all these rocks and boulders and things." Toph grinned at him. "It's just really neat."

Zuko smiled back, even though she couldn't see it, and said, "It is kinda neat when you finally see someplace that isn't all primped gardens or city streets, isn't it?" Then he leaned in close and told her, "But that's not gonna get you out of a butt-kicking, brat."

"Whenever you're ready, Prince Sparky," she told him with a smirk. Then she wriggled her feet a little and shouted to Aang, "Hey, you guys picked a great campsite. The grass is so soft."

Zuko looked down and moaned. "Oh, Shuga, why didn't you let me know?" He went and grabbed her shedding combs, something he'd made years ago, and said to Aang, "Do you want to borrow these when I'm done with Shuga?"

Aang frowned. "It's just fur, L- Zuko." He blushed a little. "Sorry. I'm just not used to your new . . . real name."

"I'm not used to hearing it either," Zuko admitted. "It's been three years since people called me that." Then he rolled his eyes at Aang. "And about the fur, maybe it doesn't bother you, but it bothers me when I have bison fur everywhere, including in my clothes, food and hair."

Katara got an alarmed look on her face. "What are you talking about, Zuko?" a slight hitch before his name told him she was having to remind herself to call him that as well.

"It's spring," he explained. "The bisons are shedding their winter coats."

"You know," added Aang, "Springtime. Rebirth, flowers blooming, and Appa gets a new coat!"

Katara smiled a little mistily, and replied, "Ah, the beauty of spring." Then Appa wound up and sneezed, getting more fur everywhere. "Stop, Appa! Stop!" Katara shouted from inside the blizzard of fur. When it finally settled, there was fur everywhere. Katara looked very unhappy.

Sokka . . . was Sokka. "It's not that bad, Katara," he told her. Then he scooped up a pile of discarded fur and piled it onto his head in a ridiculous-looking formation. "It makes a great wig!"

Zuko shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose to try to ward off the headache that was sure to develop. After Aang had joined in, Katara said, "I'm just glad we finally have another girl in the group because you two are disgusting."

That was just in time for Toph to make the most disgusting joke yet. Zuko sighed. "Toph, that is positively vile."

"_I'm_ sorry," Katara said. "Zuko. Thank you for not being disgusting," she said. "You said you have brushes for this?"

"Yes," Zuko told her. "There's nothing that sheds like a bison getting a new coat. You mind helping? I know you want to get started with dinner and the camp, but if we don't deal with this, there'll be bison hair in everything for weeks."

Katara just grabbed Shuga's reins and started leading her away from the camp. "Let's do this out in the woods," she suggested. "We can at least keep the amount of hair in camp to a minimum."

They headed off, Appa and Shuga in tow, and Katara left strict instructions with Sokka about getting the camp set up and cooking dinner. It was a great deal more pleasant to brush Shuga with company, than without. They chatted as they worked, getting frequent mouthfuls of fur, and managed to get Shuga done in half the time it usually took Zuko.

"How about a quick break?" Katara suggested. "We can head back to camp, get whatever Sokka and Aang have managed to put together for dinner, and then come back and do Appa."

He nodded. "Sounds good."

When they got back to camp, things were a mess. Toph was taunting Sokka into a frenzy, Aang was still dancing around in Appa's shed fur, and there were no tents up, except Toph's little one made of bent earth, and dinner wasn't anywhere near ready.

"What are you all doing?" Katara shrieked. "Sokka, I told you to get the tents up and a fire started. Aang, I told you to get rid of this fur, not get it into everything! Toph, all I asked you to do was join in and find some way help with the camp!"

While Sokka and Aang both shamefacedly stopped what they were doing and started tidying up, clearing away the fur and setting the camp to rights, Toph just looked at Katara and said, "Hey, I'm fine, I can carry my own weight. I don't need a fire, I've already collected my own food, and," she gestured behind her at her earth structure, "My tent's already set up."

Before Katara could explode, Zuko said, "Let me handle this."

So Katara went off to work her temper off on Sokka and Aang while Zuko said to Toph, "This _is_ about you carrying your own weight, you know."

"So now I'm so helpless I have to pay you back for the favour of coming with you?" Toph snapped.

Zuko snapped right back. "No. It's that when people – all people – travel in a group, everyone contributes to the group's welfare. That means making sure there's firewood for everyone, collecting food and water for everyone, helping every get set up for the night and if we need to, taking turns standing watch for the night."

"What?" Toph said. "Oh. I thought-"

Zuko interrupted. "You thought we were being pitying, right?"

"Uh . . . yeah." Toph frowned. "Wait. So I have to give all this food I got for me to Katara?"

"Yes," Zuko told her. "Then it will get shared out between all of us, equally. Except Sokka will be more equal than everyone else because we get tired of hearing him whine about being hungry. He's bad at collecting food, though, so Katara makes him do more of the tent stuff." He put his hands on her shoulders. "Do you understand? Katara's treating you just like everyone else. Everyone has to do their share, that's part of travelling with a group."

Toph froze. It seemed it had not even occurred to her that there might be another reason for Katara to request her help. "So, wait. I handle all my stuff myself, and I still have to help everyone else?"

"Yes," Zuko told her. "Because that way, you get a hot meal from Katara, and Sokka's and my help with carrying your things and Aang to help you with picking up your part of the campsite."

She pouted. "I don't want to help anyone else, and I don't need anyone else's help. I'll do my things for me, and you guys can do what you want for you."

It was a lesson Zuko had learned after running away from his uncle. Sometimes you needed help, and the best way to get it was to have built up credit with other people so they were more willing to offer you help in return. Toph would find that out eventually. Meanwhile, he would go and make sure Katara left Toph to learn that lesson.

He arrived just in time to see Katara fuming, with Sokka's pants literally draped over her head, and a pantsless Sokka looking at her like she was being irrational. "Hey, you're the mending person," Sokka told her. "If you want me to cook dinner, which is your job too, then fix my pants."

Katara glared. "Just what _is_ your job, huh?" she demanded.

"Hunting," Sokka replied promptly. "Guarding the camp. Starting fires. You know, manly stuff."

Before she could gut her own brother, Zuko grabbed her and dragged her off, leaving Aang to scold Sokka for saying that to his sister. "Come on," Zuko said. "Let's go talk away from the Manly One."

She let him tow her off, grumbling the whole way about Sokka and his pants. "What did you want to talk about?" she asked.

Zuko rubbed a hand over the back of his head. "Toph. I know you want her to help with the campsite, but I think there's a lesson she's going to need to learn on her own, so just let her do her own thing for now. I had to learn it after I struck out on my own."

"What's that?" Katara demanded.

Zuko smiled at her. "That you can't always be totally self-sufficient, and asking for help isn't the same as being helpless. Toph will get her own food and provide her own shelter. What we'll do, is when she finally decides she wants a hot meal or a spot by the fire, is tell her that she didn't help with the camp and wanted to be self-sufficient. Since she didn't trade her assistance, we can't exchange jook or mended clothes or what-have-you." He shrugged. "She'll figure out that being part of a group means participating. Right now, she doesn't understand that because she's never had to work with other people for any reason."

Nodding, Katara sighed. "I suppose I can let it go. But what if she doesn't get food one night? I can't _not_ give her food."

"You tell her that she doesn't get food from you unless she helps with fetching water or something the next day," Zuko said. "Simple enough. Couch it in terms of trade. If she refuses, one missed meal won't hurt her, you know that." He had a sudden thought. Now was as good a time as any, too. "You wanted to know what I got at that flea market a few days ago?" he teased her.

"Oh, now I get to know?" she asked with a mock-sneer.

He grinned and pulled the combs out of his pocket, handing them to her. "I know you think we don't notice you're a girl, except for when someone needs something mended, but I promise you, Aang and I notice. I just wanted to get you a little something for the next time you felt underappreciated."

"Oh, Lee! They're so nice!" Katara said and hugged him. She let him go and said, "Umm. I mean, Zuko. Sorry."

"It's fine," he told her. "You guys should probably keep calling me Lee around other people anyhow."

Katara was turning them around, then she suddenly pouted a little. "I don't really know how to use these, though," she said.

"I could put them in for you," Zuko offered. "I know how my sister's friends used them." She smiled and promptly let her hair down in a silky, curly wave down her back. Zuko carefully collected her hair in the way he recalled seeing Mai do it the one time he'd accidentally pulled her hair out of its combs, and wedged the combs in. It took him two tries, but he managed, and told her, "There. I think that looks okay."

She smiled and hugged him. "Even if it doesn't, thank you. It's one of the nicest things anyone's ever given me."

After all the trouble at sorting out the camp and everything, Zuko and Katara agreed to deal with Appa's fur the next day, while Toph gave Aang his first lesson in earthbending. They all ate, bid each other goodnight, and went to bed. Unfortunately, none of that was to be the next day, because Toph woke them all what felt like moments after settling down to sleep. "There's something coming toward us!"

"What is it?" Aang asked.

Toph frowned, clearly trying to figure that out. "It feels like an avalanche . . . but also not like and avalanche."

"Your powers of perception are frightening," Sokka said sarcastically.

Zuko hit him upside the head, and said, "If it's that big and we don't know what it is, let's just get out of its way."

"Better safe, than sorry," Aang agreed. They hastily packed up the bisons, and Zuko hopped onto Shuga with Sokka and Toph in tow. They took off, rapidly gaining altitude, and Zuko and Sokka found themselves staring down at a Fire Nation tank of a design Zuko had never seen before. It was pulling two . . . wheeled compartments behind it and Zuko had a rather sinking feeling he knew who was behind the monstrosity. "I've got a bad feeling my sister's behind that," he said. "Whatever that is, and it looks a lot like a tank, it's the kind of thing she wouldn't even pause to have commissioned."

"A tank?" Toph asked. "I heard about those. They're like big carts, only they're driven with coal like Fire Nation Ships."

"Close enough," Zuko said grimly. "We have to lose them."

Sokka just shook his head. "You win on the crazy sister stakes," he said.

In spite of himself, Zuko said, "What do I win? I mean, besides bragging rights that I survived growing up with her."

"I'll think about it," Sokka said. "I'll get back to you when I know."

"Don't wait too long," Zuko said. "Or I'll come up with something myself."

They flew until Shuga couldn't any more, landing in a clearing with a thud. "Okay, Shuga," Zuko said, patting her. "You can rest now." She just grumbled and flopped down, not even caring that her saddle was still on. She was snoring a moment later.

"We should do the same," Zuko said. "Forget setting up a camp, we need to rest and then keep moving."

Aang frowned. "But we've lost the . . . whatever-it-is," he said. "Why worry now?"

Zuko sighed. "Because that tank doesn't need to rest. They know our heading and they know we can't afford to be making evasive manoeuvres. They can just keep going all night until they catch up. That means we should just get some sleep and get moving in a new direction in the morning as fast as possible."

"I say we trust L- Zuko," said Sokka. "I mean, if the prince of the Fire Nation doesn't know what he's talking about, who does?"

They all settled down fast, and everyone was tired enough to fall asleep right away. Unfortunately, Zuko's worst fears were realised when Toph came out of her tent, telling them the machine had caught up to them. "How does that thing keep finding us?" Toph asked.

"I don't know, but this time I'm going to make sure we lose 'em" Aang replied.

They all climbed onto the bisons, this time, Katara got onto Shuga. Toph and Sokka had joined Aang on Appa, while Katara had gone over to Zuko to try to ease the burden on the weaker bison. They had taken off and were flying along when Katara's eyes went wide. "Look!" she said, pointing at Appa.

"Look at what?" Zuko asked, frowning.

"Appa's fur!" Katara said. "He's shedding while he flies! We're leaving a trail for them to follow!"

She was right. "Damn! We need to get Appa brushed, but we also need to stay ahead of them."

"As soon as we seem to have lost them at all, we'll land and figure out what to do," Katara said.

As it was the only sensible plan at that point, Zuko started landing Shuga as soon as it looked at all like they'd lost the tank. Sokka was off of Appa and hurrying over the moment they'd landed. "What's going on? Are you guys okay? Is there something wrong with Shuga?"

"Katara figured out how they're following us," Zuko said. "Appa's fur is leaving a trail."

Aang's eyes were wide. "Then we have to get his fur brushed out now."

"We need to split up," Sokka corrected. "You, me and Zuko should take Appa, and get a false trail going away from the girls, and Toph and Katara should head off with Shuga."

"What?" chorused Katara and Toph. "We're benders, Sokka," Katara said. "If anyone needs to be protected, it's you."

"Yeah, Sokka," said Toph. "You're the weak link, _you_ should be the one running away."

"Hey!" Zuko snapped. "First of all, _I've_ been training with Sokka, and you should know that I've been called a swordfighting prodigy. If he can stand up to me, which he can now, he's more than a little competent. Not to mention, Katara, he's a lot smarter than he lets on and more practical than you and Aang will ever be. So don't start with that." He turned to Toph. "Just because you finally have the chance to say what you think, doesn't give you the right to be nasty to other people just for the fun of it."

He was aware of Toph sticking her tongue out in his general direction, but he ignored it. "Actually, though. I think the people who should go on Appa are just me and Aang. Katara, I saw what happened when Ty Lee got to you. You're helpless without your bending and Toph hasn't faced Ty Lee and Mai before. I'd rather, if we faced off with my sister and her friends, that she had someone there if her bending gets taken away. Sokka, you need to be along _because_ you're not a bender. You can fight without bending so that won't get taken away from you. If this weren't about Appa, I'd say we should send Aang out of the field," Zuko added.

"What?" Aang asked, stunned.

Sokka nodded. "You're the Avatar. You're the one person in this group we can't afford to lose. He's got a point." He paused, looking at their little group. The Water Tribesman seemed to come to a decision. "Okay then! Ladies, up on the girl bison, we're getting out of here." He looked at Zuko. "There's an abandoned town nearby." He pointed to the mark on the map. "We'll head that way and wait for you there. If we need to run, we'll leave you a message somewhere about where we've gone."

Before Toph could protest, Zuko had tossed her onto Shuga, collecting his brush kit while he was at it, and Sokka was already chivvying his sister onto the saddle. With a snap of her reins, Sokka had gotten himself and the girls in the air, Toph hollering protests the whole way.

"Well?" Zuko said. "Let's go. We need to lead Azula, Mai and Ty Lee away. Once we've gotten another decent lead, we'll stop and start getting all that extra hair off Appa."

Aang climbed onto Appa's back and with a flick of the reins and a "Yip, yip!" they were off. It was only a moment or two after they'd begun climbing into the air that Azula's tank steamed into view. "Why are you so sure that's your sister?" Aang asked.

How to explain? Zuko ran a hand through his hair. "First, the fact that that thing has been coming after us without stopping fits her personality. Most people would have taken a break, particularly since there was a trail to follow, and picked up. Azula . . . Azula doesn't let petty things like exhaustion stop her."

"But that's not proof," Aang objected. "I mean, she's your sister, right? She wouldn't-"

"She would do anything," Zuko said, flatly. "She was our father's favourite for a reason. She was cruel and mean and manipulative and-"

Aang interrupted this time. "She sounds kinda like your mom." Then his eyes went wide.

"She's not . . ." Zuko started to snap. Then his shoulders sagged. "I don't know. All I know is she teased me horribly when we were children, always making sure to upset me and distract me so that I'd mess up my bending practice in front of my father. She tried to set the turtle ducks on fire and only stopped because mother made her."

Eyes wide, Aang asked, "Set the turtle ducks on _fire_?"

"Yes." Zuko shook his head a little. "Sometimes I think it would have been better for her if I hadn't been born. Mother would have had to set Azula up as her only chance at getting the throne put back into the hands of someone who wasn't . . . evil."

"Don't say that," Aang told him. "You're my friend, and I wouldn't have had your friendship if you'd never been born." The monk gave him that look of gentle wisdom that always reminded Zuko that Aang may have only been twelve, but he had thousands of previous lives floating around in the back of his head.

"Anyhow," Zuko said, shaking himself out of melancholy. "The other reason I think it's Azula is the money that would have been needed to commission something like that. Only someone with royal backing could."

"Oh," Aang said. "Well, you know the Fire Nation best."

They subsided into silence for a while, but Zuko knew he had to take the moment to bring up something he'd wanted to discuss with Aang. "I wanted to let you know that, once you've picked up enough earthbending to pass effectively as an earthbender, I'll start giving you firebending lessons."

"No!" Aang said sharply. "I . . . uh . . . I mean, do I really need to? The Fire Lord can't-"

"My father is one of the most skilled firebenders in the world," Zuko told him. "You need to know firebending to know what he's capable of. Even if you never firebended again once you'd learned it, you need to know what he's doing so you can counter it."

Aang looked away. "Other benders don't-"

"Other benders don't have the option of learning," Zuko told him sternly. "You need to know this."

The words came bursting out of Aang. "What if I hurt someone again? What if I hurt Katara again?"

"You won't," Zuko said, simply.

"You can't know that," Aang said passionately. "Jeong Jeong told me that I wasn't ready and I was too weak and undisciplined to learn fire, and he was right. Look at what I did to Katara! It's lucky she was able to heal herself!"

Zuko had to take a deep breath himself as he recalled seeing her blackened hands and hearing her crying at the pain. "Aang, that was before. The whole point is the discipline you'll learn from water and earth that will let you understand fire. I'm not saying I'll be teaching you tomorrow, but I wanted you to start learning once you'd gotten a decent understanding of earth."

"But-"

"No 'buts' Aang," Zuko said. "It's part of your being the Avatar. You master your own element, then you master the other three in order. You _know_ that. Not to mention that we only have until the solstice and Sozin's Comet before you have to have mastered everything."

The Avatar's face twisted in a moue of distaste. "Way to add pressure, Lee . . . Zuko."

"It's the truth," Zuko told him frankly. "We've got everyone here. Maybe we'll find you a proper firebending master later, but for now, you're stuck with me."

Aang made another face, then said, "I guess. At least you won't make me do boring breathing exercises forever."

"I won't?" Zuko asked. "Why do you think I spend so much time meditating?"

"Oh, man!"

Zuko laughed and let Aang mutter quietly about why firebending was so _boring_ if it was the most dangerous and scary of the elements. Eventually that eased off and they flew along in silence.

In accord, they agreed to land Appa and start taking his shedding fur off. Appa took a huge amount of time, because unlike Shuga, he didn't seem to get nearly the same joy out of being primped, so Aang didn't brush him as often. They wound up coating the whole clearing in fur, clogging up the small stream and starting to flood the meadow because of the dam created by the piles of shed fur.

Eventually, however, they got Appa cleaned up, and just in time. Azula and her tank came chugging around the bend. "Zuzu!" she cried with that false gaiety she loved to put on before tormenting some poor defenceless thing. "What a surprise!"

Emerging from the tank behind her were Ty Lee and, "Mai."

"Hi Zuko!" Ty Lee said, waving cheerfully. "Hey, where's the cutie?"

He'd forgotten that about the girl in pink. "The who?"

"The guy in blue?" she asked. "The one with the brown hair and the cute ponytail."

"Seriously?" Mai drawled. "Even with the bandages all over his face, Zuko looked better than _that_."

"That reminds me," Azula said as she started closing in on them, flanked by her friends. "How _did_ you get rid of that scar? The doctors all said you'd never get rid of that mark of shame."

"The spirits of the moon and ocean found him worthy of healing," Aang declared.

Zuko wanted to elbow the kid. "Aang, don't answer anything else she asks," he muttered. Not quietly enough it seemed.

"Oh, is it a secret?" Azula said with a mad, wide, grin. "I'll tell you a secret. Father knows all about how doddery old uncle went to the North Pole to find you, Zuzu."

The image from the swamp flashed through his mind. Sudden terror and the certainty that this was what the place had been telling him filled Zuko. "What did you do, Azula!"

"There's a bounty on his head now, you know," she said. "Yours too, traitor."

He would never be able to tell who moved first, just that they met halfway, sparks flying. There was something different this time, though. It took a moment for him to pin it down, but when he did, Zuko felt an amazing surge of confidence. The last time they'd fought, before his banishment, she'd just grinned maddeningly at him the whole time. Every movement she'd made showed her contempt and just how easy it was for her to beat him. This time, there was nothing in her face but concentration. Slipping under her guard a moment, Zuko struck with the finely honed point of flame he had learned from Jeong Jeong. That same flame that could be used for near-perfect cautery was used as a weapon, and Zuko grinned triumphantly as a fine line of flame erupted, starting at her left hip, crossing her chest on a diagonal and curving up and around to mark a red and black line on her cheek.

She screamed, in fury or pain, Zuko didn't know, but it gave Mai and Ty Lee pause. Which was rather a good thing, because Aang was starting to have trouble keeping up with their double-teaming. "Azula!" Ty Lee called, and Zuko was suddenly trying to dodge a barrage of fists, knives and fire.

Aang came swooping in, hitting Zuko with a blast of air, just as Ty Lee got through his guard as he dodged Mai's senbon and Azula's fire at the same time. A man can only move in so many directions at once, after all. Zuko felt her knuckles hit some points along his spine and shoulders, and suddenly both arms were useless, and it was like his inner flame had some kind of stopper on it. The wind carried Zuko into the air and onto Appa's saddle.

Then they were on the run again, while Zuko lay at the bottom of the saddle, muttering to himself about paralysis and silly acrobats.

They flew as far as Appa could take them, slept uneasily then ran again.

It took a couple days to get to where the others were supposed to be waiting, in particular because of the circuitous route they went by to throw Azula and her tank off. They reached the town, only to discover to their horror that Azula had gotten there first.

Toph was curled into a terrified ball, and wailing, "I can't _see_!"

"Toph!" Zuko was on the ground, diving for her, blasting his recovered flame at Ty Lee to drive her away from the earthbender. He was aware of Azula fighting with Katara behind him, and another figure he thought looked familiar out of the corner of his eye, but he had to keep Ty Lee from taking away Toph's ability to move as well. "I'm right here, Toph. I promise, your bending will come back. It _will_."

"It better, Sparky."

Sokka was in Zuko's eyeline, even as he dodged and weaved, trying to keep himself between Toph and Ty Lee. The training he'd done with his friend had paid off, and Mai was hard pressed to keep Sokka at a distance. She'd been reduced to close fighting because she'd used up her throwing knives, stars and senbon. Zuko could see them scattered everywhere. One final strike, and Sokka had knocked Mai out, and engaged with Ty Lee.

Unfortunately, the way she fought and moved was too alien to Sokka, and she was able to slip around him and paralyse the Water Tribesman. "Sorry, Cutie!" she said cheerfully.

Sokka's face said it all about what he thought of Ty Lee's affectionate nickname.

That afforded Zuko the opportunity to knock Ty Lee out, dropping her unceremoniously next to Mai, before joining the others facing Azula in the town square. They were lined up, facing her, him, Aang, Katara, and the last man, who was at the other end of the line, only visible to Zuko in his peripheral vision. He didn't dare take his eyes off his sister.

"Well, look at this. Enemies and traitors all working together," she said. "I'm done. I know when I'm beaten. You got me. A princess surrenders with honour."

_Azula always lies_.

The brief lull was all that she needed to launch a lightning strike at their line. Zuko reacted immediately, aware that Katara and Aang had done the same. There was a massive cloud of dust raised, but when it was gone, there was no sign of his sister. Zuko turned and saw, "Uncle!"

He was barely aware of the others moving in closer as he cradled his uncle's head in his hands. There was a smoking scorch mark on his uncle's chest where his sister's lightning had struck him. "No," he moaned. Now certain that the vision in the swamp had been about just this.

Suddenly he felt someone tugging insistently at his arms. He tried to shoulder them off, but they kept at it. Eventually, Katara's voice penetrated his consciousness. "Lee! I can help him! He's not dead!"

Sure enough, when he really looked at his uncle, there was faint movement of the hair in the man's beard. Just enough to prove it was being stirred by his breath. Katara moved in, pulling open his uncle's shirt, shoving him aside as she started healing the damage. As Zuko watched, unable to think of anything else, he saw his uncle's breathing ease and the scorch marks shrink, healing before his eyes. When Katara finally stopped, Zuko looked at her, anxiously. "Is he going to be okay?"

She smiled, laying a hand over his own. "He'll be fine. He'll be a little tender and he'll need to take it easy for a few days, but he'll be fine."

"I . . . thank you," he whispered, pulling her into a tight hug.

"You're welcome," Katara murmured into his ear.

Sokka and Toph had recovered while the were waiting, and now that Zuko was paying attention to his surroundings again, Sokka said, "Toph's buried your sister's friends up to their necks in dirt, but I think we should get out of here while we can."

With his friends' help, Zuko carried his uncle up onto Shuga, joined by Katara, who insisted on staying with her patient, and they flew off to find a safe place to camp now that they'd finally shaken the terrible trio long enough to do it.

Post-fic notes: Okay, here's the thing about Iroh being where he was. First, he knows Zuko, and he knows the kid's tendency to react badly to things like, "betraying" his uncle, not to mention the 'like another son to me' thing, so of course he's still tracking him. Second, we know Iroh is pretty darned awesome at things like that when he wants to be. Third, the White Lotus is everywhere, and I refuse to believe he couldn't manage to get a decent bread on the Avatar's (and thus Zuko's) whereabouts by just asking a few of his pai sho buddies.


	8. Lessons

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: I have discovered I have trouble writing Iroh. He's there, so I have to write him, but he really feels falsely wedged into things. I'll do my best, but I feel like his dialogue isn't . . . right, and I may have to get him away from the main cast just to stop having to stop dead and figure out what he's doing at any given time. For everyone who's been waiting, I hope you enjoy this. Yeah, I know it's filler. Also, it's an excuse to expound on why an Avatar has to learn the elements in a particular order. I like expounding.

* * *

His uncle stayed unconscious for the whole flight. Katara told him about how they'd met him. She and Toph had been furious about being bundled onto Shuga, and Sokka had been his usual condescending self (Zuko smacked himself on the forehead. What would it take to get through to his friend?). So she and Toph had stormed off together, bonding over being treated as helpless just because you weren't like other people. They'd run into Iroh, who'd treated them to a cup of tea, and joined them when they went back to Sokka, because he'd been looking for Zuko the whole time. A couple days later Azula showed up, apparently chasing her uncle on Ozai's orders, and not long into that fight, Zuko and Aang showed up.

Zuko's voice was cracking as he asked, "He was looking for me?"

"Yes," Katara said, smiling at him. "He was worried about you. He wanted to see for himself that you were okay, Zuko." Then she wrapped her arms around him in a hug. Zuko leaned into her with a sigh, watching his uncle carefully for any change in his condition.

It was as they landed that his uncle finally woke. A soft groan alerted Zuko, and he saw the man stir, then open his eyes. "Prince Zuko?" he asked.

"Uncle," Zuko said. He had nothing else to say. He was going to back away, ask Katara to look him over, just to be sure he'd be alright, but the memory of the vision in the swamp struck him. _"You pushed me away Nephew."_

So he took a risk. Zuko didn't pull away, didn't ask his uncle any questions, didn't try to use Katara as a buffer. Instead he scrambled over to the one adult who had made his childhood bearable and hugged him. Contrary to all his fears, all his beliefs, his uncle didn't push him away, demand anything of him or even say anything cutting. He just wrapped his arms around his nephew, pulling him close, murmuring, "Ah, Zuko. I was so worried. I am so _proud._" Those last four words, words he never thought he'd hear anyone say to him until he'd met Jeong Jeong, felt amazing.

Eventually they had to pull apart. "I thought . . . I thought you'd be angry," Zuko admitted. "You always seemed so . . . faithful to the Fire Nation. To my father."

"And you did not?" Iroh asked with a raised eyebrow. "You tried so hard to be the perfect son." He heaved himself to his feet, letting Zuko support him as they both climbed off Shuga. "I should have known you were acting as I did. Pretending faith so as not to lose what little safety you had."

Anxiously, Zuko pressed him. "That was all, though? You . . . you don't still believe all that about the war and the superiority of the Fire Nation, right?"

"No, Prince Zuko," his uncle assured him. "I do not." He looked around at the others as they set up camp. "I would, however, like to know how it is you came to be friends with the Avatar, and how you came into possession of this lovely beast," he said, patting Shuga. She gave him a lick of approval.

"It's . . . complicated," Zuko hedged. "Why were you in contact with Master Jeong Jeong?"

His uncle sighed. "That too, is complicated. Suffice to say, I have many friends in many places." He smiled at Zuko. "A little game of pai sho can gain you much."

Zuko rolled his eyes, and said to his uncle, "Mother had some friends of her own in unusual places." Tiring of the game, Zuko cut to the chase. "You have some people whose secrets you would have to expose to tell me why, don't you?" He didn't wait for a reply. "There are people whose secrets I have promised to keep and I cannot tell you without permission from them."

"Ah," Iroh's face cleared. "Then we shall both have to agree to let those secrets lie, Prince Zuko."

Sokka came wandering over then, saying, "Hey, Zuko? Are you gonna start making us all call you 'Prince'? 'Cause I'm not doing that for the guy who's not helping me set up the tents."

"I wouldn't expect a heathen like you to pull off anything like respectful carriage and speech anyhow," Zuko told him with a smirk. "I seem to recall someone at the North Pole who-"

"Rather than go into that," Sokka interrupted hastily, "How about you help me with the tents?"

Zuko stood and told his uncle, "You're still recovering. Why don't you stay here. I'll ask Katara to check on you."

As they headed for the tents, Sokka told him, "If you really want to stick with your uncle for a while, I understand. You don't actually have to help."

Zuko shook his head. "It's fine. It's actually kind of strange," he said. "I mean, the last time I saw him, before the siege at the North Pole, I was thirteen. I've pretty much been on my own since then."

"Okay, if you're sure," Sokka said as he picked up the tent poles and started his usual song and dance about finding a perfect spot. Zuko sighed and let him. "Not this one . . . too many loose pebbles. Not that one . . . it'll get dew on it. Hmm . . . maybe this one . . . No. There's an old gopher fox tunnel there, I'll think a snake's going to bite me all night . . . Oh! This is good . . . Except that rock has a funny shape and it'll look like an eelhound trying to eat me after sunset . . ."

Toph joined Zuko. "I like your uncle. He's a good guy."

"Thanks," Zuko said. "Are you okay? Your bending come back alright?"

"Yeah," she said with a studiously careless voice. Zuko let her get away with the false bravado. She wouldn't take being called on it well at that moment in time. "So why'd you run away from him anyhow?" she asked. "He's cool, so it's not like you were running away from your mom or something."

"I've been wondering that myself," Sokka admitted from where he was making weird runnels in the dirt as part of his complex tent-raising process. "I mean, at first, I figured he was probably just like your mom or your dad or something. Crazy and mean. Which would've explained it. But he's not."

"No," Zuko admitted. He sighed. "He was the only adult I knew growing up who didn't treat me like I was . . . wrong somehow." He sighed, glanced back at his uncle who was deep in conversation with Katara as she ran a blue, glowing hand over his chest. "But he was so good at . . . at seeming to agree with whatever my father was doing, I didn't know if I could trust him. Not for real. Not with real things."

"And when you went into exile?" Sokka asked. "He said he took his own ship and his own men and went with you. That's not somebody who doesn't care."

Zuko dropped onto a boulder and sat, feeling a little despondent. "I was scared," he admitted. "Every adult I'd ever known but him had, sooner or later, told me I was a failure."

Sokka easily filled in the blanks. "You ran before he could tell you so you wouldn't have to hear him actually say it."

Zuko nodded, throat tight. Toph plonked down next to him and said, "Well, he seems to be a pretty awesome guy, so I don't think you need to worry about that. Anyhow," she added, "I'll just go all Earth Rumble on his butt if he says it, Sparky. I can't have him making my possible future husband cry."

That was both reassuring and humiliating. "Cry?" Zuko demanded. "I'm not going to cry," he told her, "But you might. I think you still owe me a fight over you tossing gunk into Shuga's fur," he said, knowing he was avoiding confronting the issue of his uncle.

"Bring it on, Weepy," she said.

"Excuse me, Sokka," Zuko told his friend. "I have to teach a lesson to a delicate little flower."

"You take that back!"

"Make me, brat!"

She whipped a foot around in an arc, trying to send him tumbling to the ground as the earth shifted under him. Unfortunately, Zuko was watching her and saw the move coming, choosing to boost himself into the air with his firebending. Deliberately he sent a few sharp blasts of fire at the ground before he landed, trying to create confusion with her senses. It almost worked too. "Nice try, Sparky," she said, as two perfectly angled columns of rock nearly took his head off.

"Missed me," he taunted, "Losing your touch, Flower?"

"Nope," she told him, and with a gesture sent a boulder flying at him. It skimmed through Sokka's tent site, disrupting the boy's runnel things.

"Noooooo! My perfect spot! It's ruined!" wailed Sokka.

Zuko ignored him, bringing his foot up and hitting the rock head on with a concentrated fire burst that sliced it in half, causing the boulder to split in two, one half passing him on each side, the sense of blazing heat reaching him because he'd literally melted a line through the stone.

Instinctively he dropped to his front as Toph caught the two halves of boulder and yanked them back, trying to hit him from behind. Before they could continue, they both found themselves suddenly up to their necks in water, then ice. "Enough you two!" Katara shouted.

"He started it!" Toph groused.

Zuko harrumphed. "If you'd just promise not to toss gunk into Shuga's fur, I'd let it go."

"I don't care who started it," Katara snapped. "Zuko, I expected better of you. Now go and collect firewood. Toph, you messed up Sokka's idiotic perfect spot, so fix it so we don't have to hear him whine all night." She melted the water away from them, leaving them soaking wet, but able to move again. When they didn't, she shot them both a very dark look. "Move it!"

Grumbling about her interrupting their fun, they both trudged off to do as they were told. Zuko quickly steamed Toph and himself dry, muttering to her, "We'll finish this later, Flower."

"Count on it, Sparky."

"I don't see any firewood or flat ground!" Katara sang out from the other side of camp.

Zuko stomped past her as she was finishing up her examination of his uncle. "I should take back those combs I gave you."

"Try it and die," she said calmly.

"Combs?" chorused his uncle and Aang.

Katara nodded. "He got me these," she said, gesturing to her hair. Zuko blinked. He hadn't even noticed she was wearing them.

Aang looked suspiciously at Zuko. "Huh. Well, combs are a common gift in the Fire Nation," he commented. "Brothers give them to sisters and stuff."

"Yes," his uncle agreed. "Those are quite lovely. A young man just beginning to court a young lady might give her such combs as a birthday gift as well," the interfering busybody added.

The Avatar looked rather steamed, and Katara's eyes were rather wide. Zuko decided fleeing and collecting wood was the better part of valour in that case. However, the desire to spend more time with his uncle made Zuko hurry back. When he returned, he saw his uncle looking furious as he talked to the other four and he froze. What had they told him? Was he angry at Zuko? Would he . . .

Zuko didn't have a chance to panic any more, because Sokka was across the camp, dragging Zuko gently by the arm, telling him it was okay. Struggling to keep a straight face, Zuko let his friend drag him to his uncle. "What's going on?" he asked.

"I'm so sorry, Zuko," his uncle said, and pulled him into a warm hug. "Your friends have spoken of what your mother said to you. What she did to you." Iroh let him go, pulled back, his hands holding Zuko firmly in place at the shoulder. "She should have done none of it," he told his nephew seriously. "You are not at fault and she should not have said those things."

"What did they tell you?" Zuko asked.

Sokka shrugged. "Just that you thought he was going to hate you any second because your mother is an evil witch who said you weren't her son because you're a firebender, and because you actually believe her when she says you're a bad person."

"I was telling them of how there had been so few adults in the palace who did not favour your sister over you, and that your mother was one of the kindest, and most compassionate women I'd ever known," his uncle explained. A snort arose collectively from Katara, Sokka, Toph and Aang. "Which was the response of your friends. They spoke of your meeting with your mother so recently. I am saddened, Prince Zuko," he said. "I truly thought she cared for you. If I had known, I would have done more."

"It's fine," Zuko told him. "I just wasn't what she wanted. I always knew that."

"Stop justifying her," Katara muttered irritably from where she had begun to stir the stew over the fire.

"What she said," Toph added, jerking a thumb in Katara's direction over her shoulder.

Seeing that he didn't want to talk about it just then, his uncle took pity on him. Sort of. "Since it has been quite a while since I last saw you, and you have matured into such a handsome young man since," his uncle began, "I think it is my duty to ensure that you and your young Avatar friend are quite aware about the . . . delicacies of travelling with two such lovely young ladies."

Aang, unaware of the horror that was about to be unleashed, asked, "What do you mean? Is there something we should know about girls?"

Zuko and Sokka both exchanged horrified looks over the opening Aang had just given Iroh. "Now that you mention it, young Aang, there are some aspects of your education that I worry may be lacking. If you would be so kind as to join my nephew and myself?"

"Sure!" Aang said and bounced to his feet.

"I'm not going through this with _Aang_ only," Zuko muttered to Sokka. "I'm taking you down with me."

"_What?_" Sokka hissed, but Zuko was already speaking.

"Y'know, uncle," he said, very casually, "Sokka hasn't seen his father since he was fourteen, himself. Maybe there are a few gaps there. C'mon Sokka," he said, towing his friend after him.

Sokka struggled, trying not to look like a koala sheep being led to slaughter. "Why are you doing this to me?" he hissed.

"Because I'm going to have to sit through Aang getting The Talk. I'm not doing that without sharing out the horror," he told Sokka.

"I hate you."

"Feel free, but if I have to hear this, so do you."

When it was all over, Aang looked shell-shocked. He scurried past Katara and Toph, flushed and disturbed, hiding on top of Appa for comfort. Zuko was fending off Sokka's occasional punches, as the whole Talk incident had apparently been sparked by Zuko's _totally platonic_ gift of combs which his uncle was trying to convince him wasn't platonic.

"Your uncle's just . . . wow," Sokka said. "I mean, my Dad would never have talked about . . . y'know . . . technique and stuff." Then he hit Zuko again. "And don't think about using it on my sister."

Zuko hit him back. "Uncle's always been like that, and stop hitting me. The combs were totally a brotherly gift. Uncle said it himself. Brothers give them to sisters. It's not a courting thing."

"What's wrong with Twinkletoes?" Toph asked.

Narrow-eyed, Zuko said to her, "Like you don't know. I know perfectly well you were _both_ listening in."

A squeak from somewhere around Appa's head confirmed Aang was listening. "It was very educational," Toph admitted. "Katara said her Gran told her a few things Iroh left out, though."

"What!" squawked Sokka. "Like what?"

Katara shrugged. "A few contraceptive things," she listed. "Some stuff about hygiene." Just as Sokka relaxed, she added, "And some things she says a girl should know about where to touch herself so she can make sure the guy is doing it right."

"Hrrrrrk!"

"Sokka, breathe," Zuko said. "I don't think that shade of purple is a good look for you."

Iroh looked rather flustered, having been listening to the conversations between the kids. "I see," he said.

Katara nodded, "Well, when you told the boys that when they touch a girl's . . ."

Zuko learned that evening that Katara and Toph were both utterly shameless. It would have been entertaining seeing even his uncle taken aback by it, if it hadn't been so very disturbing. Especially since it became pretty clear the girls were egging each other on.

Eventually they all wound down for the night, crawling into their sleeping bags to rest. Zuko plonked himself down next to his uncle and just watched the man. After he'd been doing it for fifteen minutes, his uncle finally sat up and said, "Perhaps, Zuko, we should go for a brief walk. I find I am not tired enough yet to sleep."

"Are you sure?" Zuko asked, concerned. "The strike you took from Azula-"

"He's hinting you guys need to talk!" Katara hissed a little ways away on his other side.

"Oh," Zuko said, promptly getting to his feet and helping his uncle up. "Thanks Katara."

"Boys," she muttered in response. "You're welcome," she added.

After about five minutes, his uncle seemed to have deemed them far enough away for privacy. "What did you want to talk about, uncle?" Zuko asked.

"Why you left me," came the reply. "I planned to go with you, Prince Zuko. To be there to support you as you needed." His uncle laid a hand on his knee. "Was I somehow unclear? Did I somehow convince you I did not wish to be there?"

Zuko swallowed. "No," he said. "It's . . . it's something Sokka says I have to stop doing," he explained. "You . . . you were the only adult who'd ever . . . ever cared about me. I mean, wanted me to be happy."

"I still do, and I always will," his uncle said, laying a gentle hand on his shoulder.

It was so hard to force the words out. The fear that his uncle would turn out like the other members of his family was so strong. "I left because I thought . . . I was scared you'd stop wanting me. Like mother. Like father." He took in a shuddering breath. "I left so that I could remember you wanting to help me, and liking me and . . ." he trailed off.

"You left before you could be rejected," his uncle said softly, with so much understanding in his voice. "Oh, Zuko. I wish I could have made you understand then. I would not have turned away from you." Iroh's hands moved to cup his nephew's cheeks, his thumbs gently rubbing away the tears Zuko hadn't even been aware he was crying.

Then Zuko found himself enveloped in his uncle's embrace again. This time, he just leaned into it. This was something he'd wanted his whole life. To have family that he could lean on, that he knew cared for him, unconditionally. Who wouldn't change the way they treated him from one moment to the next because there was or wasn't an audience. When they finally pulled apart, his uncle kept a warm arm draped over his shoulders, and asked, "So how did you wind up travelling with the Avatar, Prince Zuko?"

The ice was finally broken and they began to speak of the last three years. When Zuko began to feel the crushing guilt of causing his uncle to search fruitlessly for him across the Earth Kingdom, the man would comfort him, saying how proud he was that his nephew could strike out on his own and do so well for himself. "Tomorrow I wish to see what you have learned from Jeong Jeong," Iroh told him. "He spoke well of your achievements."

"He was an amazing teacher," Zuko said honestly.

"A teacher can only be as good as his students," his uncle said. "Do not think so little of yourself."

When his uncle grew too tired to continue talking, they walked back to the campsite and lay down. His uncle fell into a deep, snoring slumber almost at once. Zuko lay down beside him, feeling oddly comforted by the noise. He fell asleep, knowing for the first time that he had family that was proud of him. It was a good feeling.

He and the others were woken the next morning by Aang eagerly expounding on what wonderful things he was going to be learning from Toph. Zuko watched him bouncing around, much the same way he did before trying to learn fire from Jeong Jeong. When Aang managed to toss himself into Shuga, who was rather disgruntled at the interruption of some arcane bit of bison courtship, Zuko shook his head and proposed to his uncle that they go so he could show what he'd learned.

It was agreed, and they headed off to another section of canyon, where his uncle sat down, and after a moment of centering himself, Zuko started going through his bending forms. Starting from the most basic and working up to the most advanced one he'd learned from Jeong Jeong, Zuko lost himself in the meditative sensation of just doing the movements and letting them lead him through the katas.

When he finished, his uncle smiled broadly. "You have done well, Prince Zuko," he declared. "You have some small flaws in execution, but they are tiny."

"Thank you, uncle," Zuko said, then grinned back. For much of the afternoon, they went through his bending katas until Sokka came stomping over demanding that Zuko get his sword back from Toph and Aang, and could they spar? It was getting boring watching Aang get hit by boulders.

Retrieving the sword took Iroh's intervention, but Zuko was happy enough to help his friend train, and happier still when his uncle joined them, offering advice while they practiced. He'd had fantasies as a young child of his teenaged years being like this. Him and a close friend practicing their fighting skills, a gentle, kind, adult presence offering advice and help with those skills. Lastly, being able to join the rest of the family at the end of the day for a pleasant meal by the fire.

During a lull in conversation, Aang piped up, "I wonder why the Avatar has to learn the elements in a particular order."

"It is because the Avatar must work up to the last element he, or she, learns, young Aang," Iroh said. "For a firebender, it is learning his way from the pure energy of fire, to the similar nature of air, through water, then finally to the most passionless and stolid of the elements, earth. A waterbender must learn to change and understand the unchanging nature of earth and the aggression of fire before understanding the ephemeral nature of air."

"And me?" Aang asked interestedly.

"You, as an airbender, must learn aggression and how to stand your ground before you can truly understand fire," Iroh explained. "A firebender fights from his centre and his root. Without first water, to teach you to take a blow instead of dodging it, and earth to show you how to channel and use force to push outward, you cannot hope to learn fire, which is about channeling and controlling the most aggressive of elements."

Zuko added, "Think about it. What's the first rule of an airbender's fight?"

"'Do not stand still as a blow cannot land if you are not there to receive it'," Aang quoted.

"Right. But in fire, you move forward to block a blow with one of your own," Zuko explained. "Water, from what I've seen, is all about taking your opponent's blow and turning it against them, and earthbenders are all about letting some idiot headbutt himself into submission."

Toph added gleefully, "Then you smack 'em hard to make 'em fall down!"

"Oh," Aang said, looking thoughtful. Then he looked at Iroh. "Do you really think the elements closest to your own are the most different?"

"I think," Iroh said carefully, "That each element is equally alike and unlike any of the other elements. Each has its similarities and differences. It is the _ways_ in which any given element is like, or unalike, another that would make learning it difficult."

The conversation made its way onto other topics after that, but Zuko found himself distracted by Katara giving him significant looks over the fire. When everyone else was finally settled for the night, and his uncle was thunderously snoring away, Zuko crept over to Katara and sat next to her where she was in her sleeping bag. A moment later he had a lap full of snuggling waterbender. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"I miss my Dad," she told him. "It just . . . all came home when I saw you with yoru uncle today." She burrowed into him a little more. "So I want-"

"Your tiger seal," Zuko said with a sigh. "Maybe I should just get you one so you can stop crawling all over me when I'm trying to sleep."

"You know you like it," her muffled voice said from somewhere on his chest. Zuko just sighed and shifted around a little, letting her snuggle.

They woke the next morning to the sight of Iroh crouched over them, a twinkle in his eye, as he said, "Perhaps you should both rise, as I do not believe young Sokka will be particularly enamoured of your romantic-"

"Nothing's going on!" Zuko hissed at his uncle and scrambling away from Katara, red-faced. She did the same, hastening to the pot in order to put something together for breakfast. "She just wanted something comforting."

"Ah, comfort," his uncle said with a distinct lilt.

Zuko glared. "Don't say it like _that_."

For the first time, the morning after playing 'stuffed tiger seal' was very uncomfortable for both Katara and Zuko, and Zuko took the opportunity to go hunting with Sokka as golden.

Or rather, the chance to watch Sokka mutter to himself as he stalked his prey was golden.

His friend was perched in a tree, muttering to himself. Zuko was sitting next to him, legs dangling as he comfortably straddled the branch, leaning against the trunk and just watching the show. Who needed theatre when they had Sokka hunting cute things? "You're awfully cute, but unfortunately for you, you're made of meat," muttered Sokka. " Just a bit closer . . ."

Zuko stifled a snigger at Sokka's monologue.

With a yell, Sokka leapt from the tree, trying to kill the baby whatever-it-was, and found himself up to his waist in a crevice. Zuko sighed, leaning his head into his hand, knowing Sokka wouldn't appreciate him pointing out the Water Tribe boy was now stuck. Not to mention he'd missed the cute thing. Sokka reared back, his sword overhead in a dramatic gesture. Zuko could have sworn he saw Sokka angling the thing in order to try to catch a bit of sun on the metal to make it glint dramatically. "Gotcha!" he cried.

Then he slipped down the rest of the way into his crevice and found himself with his arms caught against his chest and only his head, shoulders and hands peeking out of the crack. The cute thing came closer, sniffing at Sokka. "You are the lucky little meat creature," he groused. Then he looked up at Zuko in the tree. "Get me out of here!"

Zuko carefully climbed down, not wanting to get stuck like Sokka. "Are you sure? You seemed pretty-"

"Stop making jokes and get me out!"

Zuko sighed and grabbed Sokka under the arms, and started trying to pull him out. Impressively, Sokka was really wedged in there, and no matter how Zuko tugged, he couldn't seem to get his friend out. "Okay," Zuko told him. "Let take a look. Maybe you're caught on something in particular." He leaned over and shoved a hand down, first Sokka's left side, trying to see if anything in particular was catching him, then his right, then down his back.

"Are you trying to feel me up?" Sokka demanded. "Get your hand off my butt!"

"Maybe your big butt is caught on something," Zuko snapped back.

"I don't have a big butt," Sokka muttered.

Zuko stopped, leaned back and glared. "I'm just trying to help, here." He went around, but before he could try the front, Sokka said, "Can you just . . . not?"

"Not . . .?" Then Zuko realised where he'd be feeling if he poked around down there. "Oh. Right. How about I go get Toph?"

Sokka nodded eagerly. "Good idea."

"I'll be back as soon as I can," Zuko said. He hurried off, back to camp and found his uncle there. "Uncle? Have you seen Toph anywhere? Sokka's had a bit of an accident and we need an earthbender."

Iroh raised an eyebrow from where he was comfortably stirring Katara's stew. "I have not. Is he all right?"

Zuko shrugged. "He seems fine, he's just kind of stuck in this . . . crevice. I can't get him out, so I figured Toph could just bend the rock and let him out that way."

"Ah. If I see her, I shall tell her you were looking. However, as I understand it, she and the Avatar were headed to the canyon down that path," his uncle pointed, "To practice their earthbending."

"Thanks, uncle," Zuko said, and went on in further search of the pair.

Nothing.

There was the evidence they'd been at the canyon, but nothing showing where they were now. Zuko hurried back to camp, check if his uncle had seen them in the meanwhile, then went off to check on Sokka. As he got closer, he heard the words, "Now come back, Boomerang."

The animal was facing Sokka from about four feet away. Between the two of them was an apple. Beside the apple was Sokka's boomerang. "What's going on?" Zuko asked as he reentered the tableau.

"I've given up meat, and my karma is paying me back by giving me an apple," Sokka said. Then he wriggled, clearly trying to get at the fruit.

"Or," Zuko offered, "Karma is still after you by taunting you mercilessly with food that is just outside your reach."

The look Sokka shot him should, by all rights, have set Zuko on fire. "Did you find Toph?"

"No," Zuko said, a little annoyed. "I went looking, I told uncle to tell her to come here if he sees her and then I came back to see if you were still okay before I went looking again."

Sokka sighed. "Well, before you go looking, can you hand me that apple?"

Zuko chuckled a little and scooped the apple up, putting it in Sokka's hand, then leaving as Sokka began to devour the fruit. "Oh, yeah. Food. Food food food food," the other boy mumbled around his mouthfuls as he gobbled it up.

He'd just wandered around a corner, out of sight, when a pale arm with green and gold bracers grabbed him and yanked him off the path and into a tunnel that hadn't been there before. "Ow! Toph?"

"Hey Sparky," she said.

With a sigh of relief, Zuko said, "Finally. I've been looking for you. Sokka's-"

"In that crevice until I can get Twinkletoes to face his problems head on."

Zuko paused. "You stuck Sokka in that crack to teach _Aang_ a lesson?"

"Something like that. He needs a reason to face his problems," she explained. "He's always trying to find a way around things and over and under and between. But that's not earthbending."

Zuko sighed. "Can I at least let Sokka know he's a pawn in your vicious little game?"

"No," she told him. "'Cause Aang's out there already, and that would give away the game. Anyhow, Sokka just vowed to give up meat and sarcasm if the Spirits would let him out."

"Sarcasm? Really?" Zuko asked, amused in spite of himself. "Sokka couldn't give that up if his life depended on it."

"C'mon," Toph said, grabbing his hand. Then she did something and they zipped to a vantage point where they could watch the whole scene unfold.

"Aang, this is my friend Foo Foo Cuddlypoops. Foo Foo Cuddlypoops, Aang," Sokka was saying gesturing at the cute thing.

"Oh, Sokka," said Zuko with a smirk. "I'm never letting this go."

Aang sounded like a girl as he said, "Aww, what a cute name for a little baby sabertooth mooselion cub."

"He is such a girl," Toph muttered.

Zuko turned to her. "Don't you think that's a little much?" he asked. "You're a girl and you don't see me accusing you of acting like that." He waited a beat. "Flower petal."

"Shut it, Weepy," she snapped.

"When your little plan is over, it's on," he told her.

She nodded. "We can set Snoozles and Twinkle on Sugar Queen, then we'll see."

Their attention was brought back to the scene below when the roar of an irate sabre-toothed moose lion echoed through the canyon. "Sokka." Zuko started to his feet, but Toph just did something and Zuko was suddenly shackled in place.

"Don't worry," she said. "I've got it handled, and so does Aang. He needs this."

"If Sokka gets hurt," Zuko told her, "I'm going to fry your eyeballs like my sister would and I won't even regret it."

"He won't get hurt," Toph told him, supremely confident. Zuko ignored her and struggled, trying to bend his way out.

He watched, furious, as Toph moseyed down and taunted Aang into the frame of mind he needed to earthbend. When he finally got free, she had just gotten Sokka out. Zuko hurried over and looped one of Sokka's arms over his shoulder, helping his friend back to camp. They were greeted joyfully by Katara, who happily set to mothering Sokka and Aang.

Zuko just grabbed Toph up, tossed her over a shoulder and carried her off. "I'm going to get you for that stunt," he snapped. They got to an isolated box canyon, and he dropped her unceremoniously to the ground. "I can't believe you put Sokka at risk like that to teach Aang. I'm going to tan your hide," he snarled.

Her eyes narrowed in fury over his manhandling. "Bring it on, Sparky."

Two hours later they agreed it was a tie as they limped back. Katara took one look at them both and declared that neither was seriously hurt, so she wasn't healing anyone. Iroh gave Zuko a disapproving look. "You should not treat a lovely young lady in this manner," he told Zuko sternly.

Zuko felt a little ashamed of himself for fighting with Toph like that, until he saw her smirk at him, and mouth, "Weepy."

He went over, ostensibly to treat her bruises and light burns she'd gotten in the fight with him. "Flower."

"Snooty."

"Brat."

"Well, I'm turning in," Toph said, loudly. "I'm gonna hog Sparky's hot butt tonight, okay Katara?"

Then he was flat on his back, Toph was sprawled on top of him, grinning, and her earth tent had popped up around them, causing an immediate descent into pitch black.

"I hate you," Zuko groused as he heard Sokka begin to demand of Katara what exactly it was that Toph was talking about, was Katara okay with her taking Zuko's hot butt.


	9. The Best Laid Plans

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Yes, Yes I know Iroh bounces back and forth between "Prince Zuko" and just "Zuko". It's a matter of situation. Most of the time, he's formal. When Zuko needs snuggling, whether emotional or literal, he sometimes degenerates to just the name, because he's being affectionate. Okay? Logical? Please don't harangue me about it? Yes, this is much shorter, but I thought I'd reached a good, if evil, stopping point. Don't say I didn't warn you.

* * *

Things were going too well, and Zuko felt suspicious of it all. Aang had continued to pick up water apace, and after Toph's stunt with trying to get Sokka killed by sabre toothed moose lion, he'd finally found his line to understanding earth and was picking that up quickly too. More, when Sokka had declared they needed to figure out a strategy to deal with the Fire Lord, his uncle had stepped in, providing the information they needed to invade the capital. There was a solar eclipse set to happen in a couple months, which would be the perfect time to take on Ozai.

Iroh had expressed his pleased surprise at Sokka's grasp of strategy and tactics, and the two had taken to playing pai sho in the evenings as they talked sieges, attacks and enemy lines. Iroh's understanding of the deployment of Fire Nation troops, along with the information he had on the eclipse, were invaluable in coming up with a plan to bring to the various forces along the front lines.

While all this training went on, Zuko had kept busy helping Katara with running the campsites, Sokka with his blade training, Aang with his meditation in advance of teaching him firebending, getting into regular fights with Toph where they both cheerfully tried to kill each other, then made faces at Katara's back when she asked why they were so intent on it. His uncle, meanwhile, had begun to teach him the secrets to handling lightning.

"Lightning is a pure expression of firebending, without aggression. It is not fuelled by rage or emotion the way other firebending is. Some call lightning the cold-blooded fire. It is precise and deadly, like Azula. To perform the technique requires peace of mind." His uncle was sitting beside him on a rock, while Zuko listened avidly.

"Without aggression?" He asked sceptically. "Azula's nothing _but_ aggression," Zuko objected.

His uncle smiled, wryly. "But the _emotion_ fuelling it is not aggressive. Azula feels nothing personal in those attacks. She is aggressive because it is her natural state. It has nothing to do with her personal feelings."

Zuko opened his mouth to object, then suddenly stopped. In his mind's eye, he could see Azula, and his uncle was right. There were no feelings behind her attacks in any of her fights. Unlike himself, she never got frustrated or angry, she just . . . bended. He leaned back, frowning in thought.

Iroh continued with his lecture. "There is energy all around us. The energy is both yin and yang; positive energy and negative energy."

"Like the Water Tribes' Ocean and Moon spirits?" Zuko asked. "The whole, 'push and pull' . . . philosophy?" He recalled those two koi, one black, one white, forever circling each other in the small pond of the Spirit Oasis.

"Exactly," his uncle declared with a smile. "In waterbending the motion to take a blow converts that block into an offensive move and back again. They are one and the same motion, yet different parts of that motion achieve different purposes."

"Okay," Zuko nodded his understanding, fascinated by the way in which his uncle was describing this most advanced technique of firebending. It had been aggravating when he was a child, but now that he had more technique under his belt and a better understanding of bending as a whole, it was opening a whole new understanding of _how_ to bend he'd never had before.

The older man continued. "Only a select few firebenders can separate these energies. This creates an imbalance. The energy wants to restore balance and in a moment the positive and negative energy come crashing back together. You provide release and guidance, creating lightning."

His uncle was, thanks to Katara's near-magical healing skills, fully well again, and he demonstrated the movements to form lightning with all the vigour he'd ever had. Zuko watched him carefully, running through the form a few times to prefect the motions before he took a deep breath and said, "I think I'm ready."

Iroh stepped back with a nod, watching attentively. Zuko took a deep breath. _Peace of mind. Calm. Cool. Think of nothing but the energies._ He centred himself, then began. At first, moving through the form he saw nothing, no results, but he firmly quashed his disappointment. It had taken time to perfect the rest of his bending and this was no different. Suddenly though, he had a brainwave. The pinpoint accuracy of Jeong Jeong's cauterisation technique, his own perfected control of his inner fire to create winds – if he just took those techniques, that concentration, and focussed on the pure energy of the bending . . .

Before his unbelieving eyes, a small blue-white spark crackled into existence at his fingertips. So fast he almost thought it was his imagination. Then another, and another. Soon there was crackling lightning following the motions of his hands, and Zuko felt exultation roar through him. He'd done it!

That moment of internal celebration lost him his focus, however, and suddenly it wrenched itself out of his control, hurtling through the air.

Towards his uncle.

"No!"

There was no block for lightning. No one had yet made one. His uncle didn't flinch or turn away for a moment. He moved his hands and arms in what looked like a waterbending movement (why waterbending?) and the lightning struck one hand, seemed to vanish and reappeared, flying out the other straight up into the sky.

Zuko was next to his uncle a moment later, patting him down, checking him for injury and panicking so badly he didn't even hear his uncle's reassurances that he was fine. It took the combined efforts of the whole gang, including Shuga, who kept licking him in reassurance until he was soaked, and Appa, who blocked him from doing anything stupid by threatening to sit on him, and even Momo, who sat on Zuko's head, effectively distracting him long enough for everyone else to get through to him.

Katara was forced to repeat to him until she was almost blue in the face that she'd checked Iroh over, and he was showing no signs at all of having been struck by lightning. He wasn't sure what repetition she had been on when the sense of what she was saying finally penetrated his panic-stricken mind. "You're sure?" he asked.

Her eye may have twitched in annoyance, but she remained remarkably calm when she said, "He's fine. Whatever he did to stop the lightning worked."

Finally able to look fairly objectively at his uncle, Zuko finally saw what the others had been trying to tell him. His uncle really was fine. "You really feel okay?" he asked.

"Yes, Zuko," his uncle said, gently. "I am fine. I suppose I should not have been showing off like that so soon after my last injury from lightning."

Sokka's annoyed voice cut in. "Now that you're actually paying attention, and you know he's okay, can I go back to my lunch? Seriously, L- Zuko. You have to get over this panic thing you do."

"When you get over the meat obsession."

"I'm not obsessed with meat!"

"Yes, you are," chorused the other kids.

That started the others talking and they gradually wandered off, except Katara, who had stayed to monitor Zuko's condition, since, as she put it, "You're pale, clammy and I can see your heartbeat from the fluttering vein in your neck. I'm staying here until you stop looking like you're going to pass out."

Suddenly, a thought occurred to Zuko. "Uncle, there's no block for lightning, and when Azula hit you in that deserted village you didn't . . ." he stopped, unable to bring himself to say the word. "You were just very badly hurt," he continued. "And just now, when I lost control, you . . . what did you do?"

"I redirected the lightning," Iroh told him with a smile. "I was unfortunately distracted when your sister attacked and I failed to complete the movement properly. It is a technique I developed from watching waterbenders."

"Really?" Katara said, interestedly. "Zuko redirected lava once by waterbending badly," she offered.

Iroh turned back to his nephew. "That is most interesting, Prince Zuko."

He flushed. "Fire's just heat," he offered. "So I just . . . bent the fire in the rock."

"It was really impressive," Katara said.

"And very clever to think of it," Iroh added.

Zuko, embarrassed by what felt a little unwarranted in terms of compliments, said, "So how _do_ you redirect lightning?"

His uncle stood, gesturing as he spoke, to match his words. "If you let the energy in your own body flow, the lightning will follow it. You must create a pathway from your fingertips up your arm to your shoulder and down into your stomach. The stomach is the source of energy in your body. It is called the sea of chi. Only in my case, it is more like a vast ocean." He grinned, sharing his joke with them. Katara smiled back, but Zuko sighed and rolled his eyes. One thing he hadn't missed were the silly jokes at his uncle's own expense the man insisted on making.

He also didn't miss the look of commiseration his uncle and Katara shared over his refusal to find it funny.

"You direct it up again and out the other arm. The stomach detour is critical. You must not let the lightning pass through your heart or the damage could be deadly. You may wish to try a physical motion to get a feel for the pathway's flow. Like this." Iroh stood, pointing up and to the left with both arms, then took his right arm, drawing it down, across his body, tracing the path he'd described, then extending that arm out in the opposite direction.

Zuko hopped to his feet and joined his uncle, imitating the gesture. Katara watched a moment, then said, "I can't stand it!" and hopped up, not to join them, but to fuss over their technique. "You know," she commented, in between forcibly dragging their arms around to create a 'proper' fluid motion, "I've never really understood why other bending types don't replicate each other more. I saw Zuko doing his imitation of waterbending to manipulate the lava, so it's not like the techniques can't cross over."

"Well, I wouldn't want to be redirecting fire too much," Zuko said as she grabbed one arm at the wrist and pulled it through the path she wanted to follow.

"Why not?" she inquired.

Zuko sighed with relief as he finally performed the movement up to her standards and promptly sat back down. "Do you remember when I was redirecting the lava and I breathed fire?"

"Clever," his uncle commented.

"Yeah," she said. "I wondered why at the time. You didn't need to show off for anyone."

Zuko shook his head. "I wasn't showing off. Firebenders work with their own inner flames, unlike all the other elements that are working with things outside themselves. If we do too much with fire from the outside, our inner flame scorches us from the inside."

Katara's eyes were wide. "You were breathing fire because otherwise you'd burn to death?" she asked, sounding horrified.

"Yeah."

"You knew it could happen and you did it anyway?" she asked.

"Yes," Zuko said, wondering where she was going with this.

Suddenly he had an armful of waterbender, hugging him. "Thank you."

He patted her on the back, muttering that it was okay, she'd've done the same thing and then he noticed his uncle grinning at him. "Katara," he murmured. "Uncle's getting romantic notions. Please stop." She looked up to see that gleam in his uncle's eyes Zuko was starting to fear. She squeaked, backed away and ran off.

"Zuko!" said his uncle disapprovingly. "What did you say to the poor girl?"

"That you were getting ideas," he replied, a little grouchily.

His uncle sighed in disappointment and led him off to practice more with lightning. Once Zuko got the hang of it, they stopped for the day, heading back to the main camp. They'd been on the move, travelling some every couple days, in order to keep ahead of Azula. Now, however, Sokka had a specific plan. "I think we need to start getting in contact with people about the eclipse," he said. "The nearest stronghold to where we are is Ba Sing Se."

"You wish to speak to the Earth King and convince him to put troops to the invasion?" Iroh inquired.

Sokka nodded emphatically. "We need to get in to see him and start organising. We're not going to win this war if we just sit around and train."

"Fair enough," Zuko said. "We've certainly gotten a lot closer. If we cut across the Si Wong Desert here," he pointed at a section of the map, "We can save some time, too." They had been skirting the desert for days, rather than actually crossing it, but now that they had a destination, they would brave the desert as a shortcut.

There was some discussion after that, but it was agreed, and they started out the next morning, heading for the Earth Kingdom's greatest city. They were almost across the sands, the green of the land beyond the desert visible from the air, when they were attacked. A whirlwind of sand flew up, sending the surprised bisons flying off course and tumbling to the ground. Within moments they were surrounded by people in ragged, sand-coloured clothing.

Shuga was protesting loudly as she reacted to the threat by violently bending air at their attackers. They were outnumbered, but Toph was picking up how to bend sand quickly, Sokka was tearing his way through these desert people, Aang was angrily tossing them about like children's toys, and Zuko found himself fighting back-to-back with his uncle, keeping Katara safe, considering she was at such a disadvantage in the dry environment. The bisons were watching each other.

For a moment, Zuko just fought, letting battle fever carry him off. Then a scream cut through his concentration. It wasn't a human scream, it was Shuga. He whipped around to see something embedded in her tail. She was curled into a ball, desperately trying to get her teeth around the thing, and Appa was standing over her, snarling at any of the desert men who got too close. "Shuga!"

Everything went red. Zuko wasn't even sure _what_ he'd done, only that the desert men had run off, dragging the singed bodies of their comrades with them, and he was panting, sparks flying from between his lips with every expelled breath. "Zuko!" Katara shouted. "I need you over here!"

He hurried to her side, seeing the gaping wound in Shuga's tail. "What do you need?" he asked.

Katara looked like she was trying not to cry. "I can't heal her," she said. "I've used all the water and I _think_ I've stopped the worst of it, but I can't, and I can't stop the bleeding. I need you and Appa to keep her calm while we get this bandaged."

"Right," Zuko said, hastening to her head. "Hey, girl." He scratched at her head on the places he could reach, trying to keep her calm. Appa joined him, rumbling encouragingly at her. Shuga shifted a few times, clearly in a lot of pain, and Zuko buried his head in her fur to hide his tears. She was hurt because she'd been travelling with him.

When Katara finished, Shuga seemed to relax a little, nuzzling the girl when she came around to apologise for not healing the bison more. "You have done the best you could," Iroh assured her.

"I know. I just . . . I don't know enough about bisons," Katara said miserably. "I'm not even sure I healed everything right."

Aang, who had been consulting with Sokka, said, "Then Sokka, Appa and I are going to go looking for the Ba Sing Se enclave. We need help, and they're the best ones to give it."

"Okay," Katara said, sounding a little shaky. "We'll follow on foot, you guys just give us a decent heading to follow to get out of the desert."

It was decided, and the two boys climbed onto Appa, who reluctantly left Shuga after much nuzzling and rumbling, and hurried off to find help. Zuko looked back at the others and suddenly felt everything catch up to him. "We should probably just settle in for the day," he said. "I don't know about you, but I'm tired, and we should probably wait until the worst of the heat is over before trying to walk anywhere."

They all agreed, and curled up together against Shuga for shade. Then they waited.


	10. Separation, Reunion

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Yes, I threw in a Blackadder reference. I happen to like the goblin song. You can look it up on YouTube. Also, I feel like the ending was forced, but it was like the whole story was just going and going and going and going. I couldn't make it stop to go on to the next chapter. So I made it stop.

* * *

The hours passed and eventually it started to feel cool enough to move. Zuko turned to Shuga and asked her, "Do you think you can walk?" In response she heaved herself to her feet and began shuffling slowly in the direction Appa had flown. "Good girl," Zuko told her, petting her. "You just stop when you hurt too much or get tired, okay?" She rumbled an affirmative.

Katara had dropped to the rear, and after a moment, Zuko told Shuga he was going to check on Katara and he'd be back up at her head shortly. When he got to her, she was staring fixedly at Shuga's tail. She glanced at him and said, "I'm a healer. I should have been able to do better than that."

"You did the best you could," Zuko said. "Are you just back here because you feel guilty?"

"No," she muttered. "I'm not _you_."

"I do _not_ get irrationally guilty," he objected.

Toph was clearly listening from where she was trudging along letting Iroh guide her. "Yes, you do."

"Do you mind?" Zuko said to her. "This doesn't involve you."

"I don't mind at all," she replied with a wicked grin. "That's why I'm talking to you."

Zuko made a sound of disgust and turned to Katara. "Anyhow, you have nothing to feel guilty about."

"I'm just here because I want to keep an eye on the injury. Just in case Shuga pushes herself too far." Zuko eyed her, but none of them could afford to waste the energy on a fight, and she had a point. So he went back up to Shuga's head and walked beside her, asking every few minutes if she needed to stop. Finally, Shuga deliberately sneezed on him as an expression of her irritation.

"I get the point," he groused at her. "Ew."

It was a few minutes later, that his uncle called them to a halt and tripped merrily off, returning with a cactus he'd chopped open and carried in his cloak to avoid the needles. "Ah! I may have our rescue here," his uncle said. He cheerfully gulped some of the juice from the plant. Then he paused. "Of course, this may be the wrong kind of cactus."

"What do you mean, uncle?" Zuko asked in dread.

Iroh tilted his head, saying, "I suppose I should have thought more before taking a drink."

"Why?" Katara inquired.

Iroh frowned at her, his eyes a little narrowed. "One kind of cactus makes a wonderful thirst-quenching drink."

"The other?" Zuko demanded.

His uncle dropped the cactus to the sand and started cavorting about. "Look at all the goblins! See them dancing!"

Katara promptly poured the juice onto the sand. "It was a nice hope while it lasted," she said mournfully.

"See the little goblin/ See his little feet./ And his little nosey-wose,/ Isn't the goblin sweet?" sang Iroh.

Toph nodded along to the singing. "It's a catchy little tune," she commented.

"Uncle?" Zuko said, grabbing the older man by the arm. "Come on. Why don't you sit down?"

"Come, Prince Zuko! The goblins are calling us to dance with them!" His uncle pulled away doing an odd sort of hopping dance across the sand to music only he could hear.

Zuko felt a frisson of fear. His uncle had always been a bastion of calmness and sense. Even when he was playing at being a dotty old fool there was a sense of . . . reason behind it. This was just crazy. Like Bumi crazy. "Uncle! There aren't any goblins! Just stop!"

"Zuko, it'll wear off," Katara said, reassuringly. "Let's just try to keep him corralled, and let it go. If he's still . . . off, in a few hours, we'll worry then, okay?"

He let himself be soothed, and they just spent the rest of the walk, far into the evening, keeping Iroh from wandering off. It was a good thing for Zuko's panicked self that several bisons landed next to their little camp after his latest attempt to talk his uncle down.

Shuga bellowed and made a move to get to Appa, then sank back down with a squeal of pain. Appa was next to her, rumbling and grunting his concern. "What's wrong with your uncle?" Sokka asked, as Iroh started jigging again.

Zuko twitched, but before he could say anything hysterical, Katara cut in, briskly. "He thought he recognised one of the cactuses. Unfortunately, instead of it being safe, it's hallucinogenic."

Four unfamiliar people had climbed down from their bisons and joined them. "Yeah, cactus juice can really pack a punch in its unrefined form," said one. "I'm Jang," he told them. Then pointing at the other two men and the woman as he went, "This is Huo, Taka and Lan." He looked sadly at Shuga. "We have a sling. What we'll do is get it under her, and then Tumo and Miko will be able to carry her back to the enclave."

It took a while, particularly with Iroh dancing about, distracting Zuko with worry, and forcing him to hit Sokka every time his friend sniggered at the man's antics. They managed, however. It was as they were about to figure out how to strap Iroh onto Appa's back that the man went running off again, and started firebending wildly into the night sky.

"A firebender!" exclaimed Lin.

It was Taka who looked especially grim, however. "Iroh. I knew I recognised that name," he said. "That's the Dragon of the West."

Katara looked annoyed. "He's also the man you have to thank for the moon still being in the sky."

The others snorted, but Aang piped up. "It's true. When Admiral Zhao killed the spirit of the moon in the Spirit Oasis at the North Pole, it was Iroh who stopped the rest of his men and figured out how Princess Yue could bring the spirit back to life."

All four stared. "That unscheduled eclipse of the moon was caused by someone killing a spirit?" asked Huo.

Sokka nodded. "The Princess of the Northern Water Tribe died giving back the moon spirit the strength it gave her when she was born. Iroh recognised that she'd been touched by the moon spirit."

The four Nomads separated and had a quick, muttered conference. "We cannot just bring the General into the enclave," Lin explained. "Certainly not without the agreement of the council." She sighed. "We will bring this matter before the council. In the meanwhile, we can only suggest that your group split up, and some of you come with us, and the others join the refugees heading to Ba Sing Se. We can drop you off on the main road and send someone out with news to catch up with you."

"We'll figure out who's going and staying on the way out of the desert," Sokka said. "C'mon, let's get onto Appa. We'll figure out who stays with Iroh on the way."

They wrestled Iroh onto Appa and took off, following the other two bisons as they flew a dangling Shuga towards the enclave. Zuko felt horribly torn. On the one hand, he'd just found his uncle and the man was drugged out of his mind. On the other was his longest-standing friend, with a big hole in her tail.

"Okay," Sokka said, "I was figuring Aang would definitely go with you into the enclave. The question is, who of the rest of us is going to stick with Iroh?"

Katara sighed. "I think Toph should go with Iroh, and either you or me, Sokka, would go. I think they could probably pull off pretending to be a grandfather and his granddaughter travelling to Ba Sing Se, and we'd play at being servant on the way."

Sokka nodded. "Right, and the other one goes with Zuko and Aang."

"Sounds good to me," Aang said. "Toph? Zuko?"

It was a reasonable plan. "It . . . it sounds fine," Zuko said, staring anxiously at his uncle, who was singing the goblin song again.

Toph piped up, "That works. Iroh'll probably be a good granddad."

"Okay, so that just leaves me and Katara," Sokka said.

"I kinda want to stay so I can learn more about bisons," Katara admitted. "I wasn't able to heal Shuga as well because I just didn't know enough about how she's put together. Appa or Shuga might get hurt again," she told them. "I want to be prepared."

"Good enough for me," Sokka said. "Then that's what we'll do. I'll go with Toph and Iroh, pretending to be protection hired for the trip."

It was a good thing they'd decided by then, because the bisons carrying Shuga had started to land. It was the work of a few minutes to get Iroh off, and Sokka and Toph's things. Zuko hopped down for a moment, and hugged his uncle goodbye. "I'll see you soon, okay uncle?"

"Goodbye, my son," said Iroh.

Zuko flinched away, and said, a little coldly, "I'm not Lu Ten."

"I never said you were, Prince Zuko. It does not make me feel any less as though you are my son. I love you the same." Then the moment was over and Iroh was lost again, babbling about whether they wanted to hear about the goblin or not.

He couldn't help grimacing a little as he rejoined Katara and Aang on Appa. "It'll be okay," she murmured. "You'll see." She squeezed his hand and he squeezed back, and they shared a brief, private smile. Doing the tiger-seal thing wasn't an option then, but this was good enough for now.

They all followed the bisons in the lead through the air and to a mesa, just out of sight of the city walls. From bison-back, their guides did something with their bending, and the whole top of the mesa seemed to fold away, revealing an enormous hole in the ground. Appa balked, and Zuko heard Shuga bellow something that made Appa grumble and follow the other bisons in. "What do you bet she just called him a chicken-pig?" Katara asked.

"I wouldn't put it past her," Zuko said. "Oh," he added, "I think that, for now, we should keep who I am quiet. Just . . . to make this simple. You know?"

"You'll be Lee again for the duration?" Katara asked.

"I think so," Zuko replied, nodding.

Aang looked sadly at him. "It doesn't seem fair that you don't get to be who you really are most of the time," he said.

Zuko shrugged, resettling a little. Appa's saddle was so much better than Shuga's for the rider's comfort. He was going to have to see about how to fix that. "It's okay. It's better than I was used to now, anyhow."

There was nothing to say to that, really. Katara squeezed his hand again, anyhow.

They followed the other bisons through a long passage large enough for them to fly Shuga the whole way, emerging into a large underground chamber, much like the other enclave bison shelters, this one lit with phosphorescent stones. As Shuga was set down, several people instantly converged on her, quickly undoing the bandages and slathering something on the wound. Appa landed and hurried over to stand nose-to-nose with her while Zuko and the others dismounted. Katara immediately joined the healers at Shuga's tail, explaining what she'd done and how she'd done it. Zuko found himself off to the side, hovering anxiously.

From behind him, he heard Aang suddenly shout, "Azula!"

Zuko whipped around and saw, "Hello, Aiko."

"What?" said Aang.

There stood his older sister. A slight tilt of her head, that hint of an arrogant smirk, and for the first time, Zuko realised just how much both his sisters took after his mother in looks. He took in a breath. "I'm glad you're okay."

"Are you really?" she asked. "Mother said-"

"Mother thinks I'm worthless no matter what I do," Zuko replied sharply. "I've had it pointed out rather forcefully that I'm not her son."

Aang spoke up, hesitantly. "So she's _not_ Azula?"

"No," Zuko said. "I want you to meet my older sister, Aiko, Aang." He turned back to her. "Aiko, meet the Avatar, Aang."

"What does he mean, 'She's not Azula'?" Aiko asked.

Zuko turned back to watching the healers fuss over Shuga. "He means you look so much like our delightful baby sister that you could be mistaken for her. Didn't our gracious lady mother ever tell you that?"

"No," Aiko told him. "And I wouldn't believe you about it either because you're a liar and a firebender."

Zuko just sighed. It wasn't worth arguing about. Aiko had never been much outside of the enclave in the Fire Nation, and she probably never went out of this one either. Whatever their mother told her was enough gospel truth for her. Aang, however, was offended. "What is wrong with everyone in this family?" he demanded. "If this is what happens with most families, no wonder we always took the children to be raised in the temples."

"You really shouldn't take us as typical, Aang," Zuko told him, hastily. "I think Katara and Sokka are a much better benchmark."

Aiko was watching this whole exchange with a look of confusion on her face. "What is he talking about?" she asked Zuko.

"I'm talking about the fact that the Fire Lord is trying to take over the world, Princess Azula is just horrible, and his mother out and out said he was evil just because he's a firebender!" Aang was very incensed by this point in time. The sheer unfairness of it all really seemed to rub the boy the wrong way. "And then you come along and tell him he's a liar as though it's the same as being a firebender. The only decent people in your family seem to be Iroh and Zuko."

"A firebender?" came a sharp voice from behind them. "Avatar, you didn't mention you wished to bring a firebender into the enclave."

They whipped around to see a new face. "Uh . . . Qeng," Aang said, wide-eyed. He seemed about to defend himself, when the dark look on the man's face made him pause.

Aiko seemed to come to a conclusion. "It's a figure of speech," she said. "An insult, common among those of us in the Fire Nation enclave. A general insult of someone you dislike. My brother and I rarely get along well." She turned to him, aiming one of the cheap shots of air he'd learned to deflect as a matter of sheer reflex all those years ago. He'd been the butt and victim of airbending pranks until he learned how to fight them off in a limited way.

This time, Zuko didn't just do some minor block to keep himself from taking the brunt of the hit. He spun back a move he'd picked up from Aang, slicing a path through her shot, splitting the blast around him. With the same ease Azula had always shown with her firebending, Aiko blocked and dissipated his return shot with her bending. "Could I do that if I were a firebender?" Zuko asked, coolly.

"My apologies," the man said. Then he bowed. "I am Qeng. I am in charge of our middle ring. I was given to understand you wished to stay with your companions, Avatar."

"Yes," said Aang slowly. He was trying to figure out what had just happened. "I assumed we'd all be in the same place."

"This presents a difficulty," the man said.

Aiko snorted. "It only presents a difficulty because you can't decide whether my father being a firebender means I belong in the lower ring, or my being of noble blood and an airbender of some talent means I belong in the upper ring."

"What's all this stuff about rings?" Zuko asked.

Aiko sighed, dramatically. "They divide people up here according to where they are on the social scale. The least valuable people are in the lower ring, and the highest are in the upper ring. The middle ring is for everyone who's not really important, but also isn't just a peasant."

He nodded his understanding. "So you're still miffed about not being in the upper ring where you deserve to be," he said.

"No!" she snapped. "Do you think I'm our mother? I'm upset because I can't even go into the other rings without being stared at suspiciously and-"

Qeng gave a supercilious snort. "Her lover is from the _lower ring_," he said, infusing the term with sheerest disdain.

"So what if he is," she snarled. "It's not your business who I'm seeing."

"It is if you lower the value and worth of your section of the ring by . . . cavorting with that man."

Zuko took this in with surprise. It was a side of his sister he'd never seen. Aang hastily spoke, "So what's the trouble with where my friends and I stay?"

Aiko turned and said, "I assume that, since Lee's my brother-"

"Didn't he just call him, 'Zuko'?" interrupted Qeng.

This put them on familiar ground. It was a game the siblings had played at their last enclave. Back and forth until their inquisitor was so annoyed, he'd let it go to make them be quiet. "Mother had twins, you see."

"Lee and Zuko."

"They're easily confused with each other."

"No we're not."

"So you say"

"The major difference-"

"Is the bending."

"And everything else."

"Except you look the same."

"No we don't."

"Yes-"

"Fine!" the man said. "I don't care. The point is, he's her brother, and he must stay in the middle ring unless I hear otherwise." He turned to Aang. "You, Avatar, and your other companion will be in the upper ring. I will fetch Kang. He handles all those in the upper ring." Then he practically ran away.

"I think that's a record," Aiko said contemplatively. "You've gotten better at it, though."

Zuko smiled hesitantly at her. "I have a friend who wants to try that someday. He practices with me."

Aang was looking very unsure. "Z- Lee. Are you sure? I mean, after what happened with your mother . . ." he trailed off. "I just . . . Sokka said me and Katara should keep an eye on you."

"It'll be okay," Zuko told him. "I need to talk to Aiko anyhow. Properly. You go with Katara. We'll catch up together later." When Aang looked uncertain, Zuko added, "I promise this won't be like with my mother. If anything happens I'll ditch Aiko and come find you two. Okay?" Aang kept looking uncertain, so Zuko played a trump card that was going to get him in trouble with Sokka later. "You'll be alone with Katara," he wheedled. "I know you like her."

The Avatar took the bait. "Oh. I . . . Thanks Lee!" he said and scampered off.

Zuko shook his head. "That's gonna get ugly at some point," he said. He turned to his sister. "I think we really need to talk," he told her. "Just . . ." he shrugged.

"I think so too," she told him. "There's a lot of things that . . . that I know now. Did you want to stay here with Shuga a while longer?" she asked.

Zuko nodded gratefully at her. "Just until I know for sure she's okay and settled."

They stood and watched the healers finish up with Shuga, the occasional burst of glowing energy showing Katara adding her own skills to the process. It was strange for Zuko. His sister had always toed the line their mother had drawn regarding him. Calling him a liar and firebender in the same accusatory tone as if the second were as much his fault as the first was just how she'd addressed him. It had always had that ring of echoing, though – a tendency to sound as though she were merely copycatting what their mother said in lieu of her own opinions.

Unlike Azula's taunting, which was always nasty and sincere, there was a sort of reluctant admission to Aiko's words. As though she cared on some level but was forced to admit he was inadequate. He'd heard similar tones from people speaking of a loved, but eccentric or malingering member of the family.

When the healers finished, Katara waved them over. Zuko immediately went to Shuga's side and murmured endearments and scratched her on all her favourite bits he could reach from the ground. "You'll be okay tonight?" he asked. "Do you want me to stay if you need someone to run for a healer?"

She rumbled a negative and nuzzled him. Then gave him a shove with her nose in the direction of the buildings people clearly were heading to for the evening.

"Okay. I'll leave you and Appa alone."

He walked back to Aiko, to find her looking an odd combination of amused and disturbed. "Your friend Katara is very . . . forceful," she told him. They started walking together towards that so-called middle ring of the enclave.

"She can be," Zuko admitted. "What happened?"

Aiko sighed. "She pretty much threatened me if I was as horrible to you as she claims mother was."

"Oh," Zuko said, feeling a warmth spread through him again as he thought of his friends and the way they always were willing to stand up for him, even when he felt he'd done something wrong. "She feels mother was unfair to me," he temporised.

Aiko looked at him sideways. "She _was_ unfair to you," she said. "Since I started seeing Thuan, he's . . . changed my outlook on a lot of things. I shouldn't have said what I said to you. It was just . . . habit. A bad habit."

"The rest of the world's a lot different than Cheng Dhu," Zuko commented, ignoring the first and last parts of what she said. "Do I get to meet him? I want to see if Sokka's right about brotherly impulses in the defence of our female relatives."

"Sokka?" she asked.

Zuko gave her another hesitant smile. "He's my friend. Katara's older brother."

They'd reached what was clearly her apartment by then, and Zuko leaned against the wall as his sister unlatched the door and showed him into the small, but well-appointed space. Once they were inside, she turned and said, "Lee . . . _Zuko_. I have to know. Is Thuan right? Were we horrible and unfair to you all those years?"

"Aiko . . ." Zuko opened and closed his mouth, helplessly. He hadn't expected this. She'd never had much time for him to begin with, and the back-and-forth routine had just been a survival tactic for him. Something to do so the enclave wouldn't know how close they were to being known to the royal family and put through a burnout. She was disdainful, distant and a little mean most of the time. He hadn't seen her that often either, because their mother had kept them separate most of the time. Zuko had assumed she hadn't wanted her eldest corrupted by his firebending nature.

She'd actually always confused him a little. Because sometimes – rarely, but sometimes – it was like she'd forget she was supposed to dislike the 'evil firebender', and they'd just be siblings. In the end, he'd lumped her in with his mother as someone he cared for who would never care back. This all took him by surprise.

Aiko looked earnestly at him. "I just . . . I always assumed I was due something as the eldest daughter of the Fire Lord. I'm royalty," she explained. "Thuan he . . . he asked me why, if my being the child of the Fire Lord should guarantee me special treatment, did the same background mean you were somehow less worthy than I am."

"I'm a firebender," Zuko said slowly. "That was always the reason. Mother never loved either Azula or me because we're firebenders."

"But that's not your fault," his sister said. "Maybe you're more prone to savagery. Maybe you're not as . . . as . . . spiritual as an airbender, but that just meant we should have tried harder to help you be _better_." She looked upset. Perhaps even close to tears. "Mother said you were banished because you were trying to keep a company of soldiers from being sacrificed for no reason. That's not the actions of a f- bad person."

Bitterly, Zuko snapped. "Mother felt I should have let them die because they were Fire Nation. She didn't care they weren't firebenders. She didn't care they were all younger than eighteen. All that mattered was that the people of fire should be dealt with the way the Nomads were a century before."

"Oh, Zuko." She shook her head. A dark almost-laugh escaped her. "I'd always looked up to her. Then I came here and everything is so . . . so different from what I thought it was."

"I know the feeling," Zuko said.

For the first time, Zuko found himself talking to one of his sisters. It was awkward. She had been so sheltered in the Cheng Dhu enclave, all she'd known was the propaganda she was told by the airbenders there. Being forced to fend for herself in a new enclave, one that was so very different than her old one, had changed her perspective. As had this mysterious Thuan, who Zuko heard a lot about over the evening.

She was still her old, arrogant, self. She still looked down on him as a firebender, but it was with pity and a desire to 'correct' his nature, rather than a certainty of his inevitable evil. He wasn't sure he liked it, but it was better than being told everything he did came from a place of darkness.

"So tell me about this Katara," she finally said, once they'd exhausted all the other topics of discussion that were relatively uncontroversial.

Zuko frowned. "She's a waterbender, a prodigy actually. She's so _strong_ in her element." He smiled a little enviously. "You saw that she can heal. She can also fight like a demon if she's got any water to hand. It's kind of amazing."

"Heal and fight too? Impressive combination," Aiko commented.

Zuko nodded. "She's also the practical force in our group. Sokka's the one who comes up with tactics and direction, Aang's the Avatar, but Katara keeps us fed, keeps the campsite together, keeps everyone from running off in all directions and just . . . keeps us going."

"She sounds pretty impressive."

"She is. She's also completely crazy and does these things which shouldn't work at all, but somehow do. It's like she's got the Spirits' own blessing on her intuition. It's annoying as all get-out."

Aiko smiled coyly. "So how long have you been in love with her?"

"What!"

"You can't keep your eyes off her, she's amazingly protective of you and you look at her the way I look at Thuan." His sister looked eagerly at him. "It's kind of obvious."

Zuko shot a narrow-eyed look at her. "Who've you been talking to?"

"No one," she protested. "Just you. And, of course, listening to her dire threats of retribution if I did anything horrible to you."

There was a series of loud knocks at the door, and Aiko, with clear reluctance, went to open it. On the other side were Katara and Aang. "Has she done anything I need to freeze her to the wall for?" Katara asked, poking her head around Aiko to look at Zuko.

"No," Zuko said. He was quite aware this wasn't going to get him out of the conversation with his sister in anything but the short term. "You came down here to check?" he asked, feeling all warm and fuzzy again.

Aang said, "The last time we left you alone with someone from that part of your family you needed Sokka to rescue you, and you looked like you were sick with something after," Aang said. "We were worried."

That killed Aiko's mood. "I just have such a hard time believing it," she said. "She was so . . ."

"Kind," Zuko said. "That's the word you're looking for. She was always kind and affectionate to me in front of other people. When you were _there_ she was kind." He shrugged. "I wasn't going to say anything. Who'd believe it?"

Aiko nodded. "That's it. Thuan made me realise how wrong it all was when he pointed out that she never stopped me from being horrible to you."

"You weren't horrible," Zuko said, rolling his eyes. "Compared to Azula, you were a paragon of kindness."

"Compared to Azula, _everyone_ is a paragon of kindness," muttered Katara to Aang, who nodded in agreement.

"Anyhow," Aiko said, trying to resurrect a better atmosphere, "What's important is that Zuko is doing such a wonderful job of overcoming his deficiencies as a firebender." She smiled. "You'd think he was an airbender with the way he's going. Befriending the Avatar and the way he's so forgiving – it's fantastic."

Katara's eye twitched. Recognising the imminent explosion, Zuko said, hastily, "So now that you've found out I'm fine, that Aiko's not going to do or say anything bad," he spoke louder and faster to keep Katara from interrupting, "Why don't you two head back up to the upper ring. We should all get some rest it's been a long couple days." He leaned over to Aang, "Didn't I tell you now's a great time to make your move?"

With much bustling and shoving, he got them out the door. The last thing he needed was to lose the relationship that was finally coming to fruition with his sister because Katara was feeling angry that the other girl felt firebenders were naturally inferior. It was fine, he was used to that kind of casual dismissal from Azula and it didn't bother him.

Finally they were gone.

"She's very defensive of you," Aiko said as a parting shot before going to bed. "You really shouldn't be shoving her at the Avatar. You two would go really well together."

Zuko stomped off to bed in high dudgeon over the whole thing. Katara was just a friend. She was crazy, Sokka's baby sister and Aang wanted her. He wasn't going to go there. He'd never even thought of her as a girl, not until the Northern Air Temple and all that talk of exotic hair loopies anyways.

The next day, he got to meet Thuan. The man was the nonbending child of an airbender and an Earth Kingdom man. He'd lived on the outskirts of Ba Sing Se his whole life, preferring to stay outside the city. "You think the segregation is bad in here?" he said. "Inside the city you need papers just to move from one ring to another, let alone getting into the city itself."

"Great," Zuko said in irritation. "Is there any way to get those papers from out here?"

"You can talk to some of the leaders in the enclave. Or rather, I'd suggest you have the Avatar speak to them," Thuan told him. "If you're going to try living in that city for any period of time, you'll want the papers for the upper classes. They're the only ones that'll have the freedom to go where they want, when they want."

For the first time, Zuko understood Sokka's impulse to keep everything male away from Katara. He'd always felt rather sorry for anyone foolish enough to catch Azula's eye. Aiko was another matter, and this new relationship with her, that he owed to Thuan, made him feel awfully protective of her. Meanwhile, his sister looked like the handsome nonbender had put the sun in the sky, and done it just for her. Thuan had the ability to break Aiko's heart if he so chose. It was strange, and not wanting to be crazy and weird like Sokka, Zuko suppressed his desire to pull the man aside and threaten him with a good charring if he so much as thought about doing something to hurt her.

He was somewhat surprised when, after his sister had ducked into her room to change before they went out to meet up with Aang and Katara, Thuan said, "So here's your opportunity."

"I'm sorry?" Zuko asked.

"You know, 'If you hurt my sister I'll make sure they never find all the pieces of you.'"

Zuko blinked. "I . . . hadn't been planning to say anything like that." He smiled, a little wryly. "Aiko and I aren't exactly close enough for her to appreciate it, even on an intellectual level."

"She's getting better," Thuan reassured him. "Spirits know her sense that she's better than everyone else is irritating, and the fact that some part of her still thinks she's doing me a great favour by even speaking to me is appalling." He turned and looked longingly at the closed bedroom door. "But there's just something about her . . ."

"If you say so," Zuko said, doubtfully.

"Oh, when I first met your sister, she was _nasty_," Thuan said. "She marched into my shop with her nose in the air, calling me peasant every other word and trying to claim that, because her mother was some sort of Name in the Fire Nation that _she_ deserved special treatment." He grinned. "When I asked her what her mother's suffering had to do with her getting special treatment, she tried pulling the royalty card."

Wide-eyed, Zuko asked, "What did you do?" He wondered a little what his reception would be among normal people of the Earth Kingdom if he told them who he truly was, and maybe this would give him a hint.

"I tossed her out, telling her that pride in being part of that family was stupid and I wasn't going to serve some faithful Fire Nation flunky."

"I'm sorry to say it took me two weeks to figure out that being Fire royalty doesn't mean anything but trouble in the Earth Kingdom," Aiko said. "It just didn't occur to me." A wry smile crossed her face. "It's kind of ironic that all that propaganda we claimed we'd avoided in Cheng Dhu still did its work."

"How did you convince people you weren't the Fire Lord's daughter after all that?" Zuko asked, curiously.

Thuan smirked. "I just told everyone she was an inveterate liar. That she _was_ nobility, but not more than that."

"They believed him, too," she said.

Zuko gave her a tentative grin. "It's a crazy idea, isn't it? The Fire Lord's eldest daughter, the crown prince and the Fire Lady all wandering around homeless in the Earth Kingdom."

"Exactly," she said. They set off in fairly high spirits, but by the time they had reached the home where Aang and Katara were staying, Zuko was feeling rather worn by Aiko's constant attempts to 'help' him 'reform' from his 'firebender's ways'.

He was incredibly grateful when Thuan reminded her that she had to get to work, and they left Zuko alone. He joined Katara and Aang in Katara's room, and collapsed onto her bed with a heavy sigh. "I don't know how much more of that I can take," he said.

"What did she do?" Katara demanded, getting to her feet. "I'll go show her what-"

"She didn't _do_ anything," Zuko said, grabbing her hand and pulling her down beside him. "She's just . . ." he paused, searching for the right words. "I think she's convinced that my being a firebender means that if I'm not . . . not shown the right way, I'll revert to being a savage. Or something. I don't know. She still believes the things Mother does about basic firebender nature, she just wants to . . . save us? I think?"

Aang offered, "It's an improvement, right?"

"It is," Zuko said. "But it's really annoying to have someone come by, telling me over and over that I need to overcome the fundamental evil inherent to myself."

Katara started muttering and said, "I'll show her fundamental evil." This time, Aang joined him in making her sit down.

Hoping to distract Katara from attempting to beat his sister black and blue, Zuko said, "So her boyfriend told me that you need passes to get around in Ba Sing Se. It's segregated in there, like in here, only worse." That got their attention. "He suggested that Aang ask the council about getting us passes so we can pass through the various rings without trouble."

"Good idea," Aang said. "I'll go ask about it now." He zipped out the door a moment later.

Zuko blinked at his abrupt departure. "Wow. What's up with Aang?"

Katara hit him.

"Ow! What?"

"You know what," she groused. "You had to encourage him?"

Zuko frowned, then made an educated guess, based on Aang's complete inability to lie well under pressure, combined with his complete lack of understanding of girls. "Is this about his crush on you?"

"Yes!" she said, throwing her hands in the air in exasperation. "Why would I think about him like that?" she demanded.

Taking his very life in his hands, Zuko replied, "Because Aunt Wu said you'd marry a powerful bender and _you_ suggested kissing him in the caves."

"He's twelve," she protested. Zuko fixed her with a sceptical look. "Shut up. Like you haven't done stupid things," she muttered.

"So . . . taking a wild guess, I left you two alone so he could make his move, and you told him there was no point?"

Katara nodded, managing to look both indignant and kind of mopey at the same time. "Then he asked if I was in love with you."

Zuko looked at her in dread. She wasn't going to say . . .

"I told him I wasn't. Obviously. You're just a really good friend," she said.

Zuko nodded emphatically. "Exactly. We're just friends."

A somewhat awkward silence descended, because really, what did one say after such a statement? They puttered around quietly after that, because the whole thing felt a little weird. Aang came back, informing them that he'd gotten passes, and after some discussion they decided to leave Shuga behind and catch up with Sokka, Zuko and Toph.

Shuga was fairly displeased with the solution, but until she was well enough to leave there wasn't much to be done. The enclave was fairly close to Ba Sing Se, however, so Appa would be able to fly back almost nightly.

So Zuko said his farewells to Shuga, promised her he'd be back, threatened dire consequences if he found there'd been any hanky-panky in his absence, and joined Katara and Aang on Appa as they took off for Ba Sing Se. The silence on the bison was extremely awkward, and Zuko couldn't help but wonder if Aang and Katara would have been better off without him there.

She hit him. "I don't even know what you're thinking," Katara informed him as he protested. "But I know it's stupid. Sokka made us promise not to let you think stupid things about yourself."

"You hit me."

"Stop being dumb and I'll stop hitting you."

"I thought you said violence didn't solve anything," Aang said in tones of reproof.

Katara blinked, and said, "That's not violence. That's . . . discipline. Training. I'm training him to associate pain with stupid thoughts."

"You sound like Sokka," Aang complained.

"You really do," Zuko chimed in. "Does this mean we can expect that you'll stop doing crazy things?"

When Aang laughed and she hit him again, that was good. Things were back to normal.


	11. Ba Sing Se: Arrival

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: This was supposed to get further along in things, but it's been a while since I updated, and certain people, who shall remain nameless, have been subtly threatening me with death by pirhana if I don't. So, I give you the update, and hopefully I can get us to the end of this book within another two to three chapters. I mean, considering I don't even have to _think_ about factoring in "Appa's Lost Days" . . . No, if I do a variation of "Shuga's Lost Days", it's going in next book, so don't even think about it. On another matter entirely, Iroh's tough as nails. Why wouldn't he go on two long walks in one day?

* * *

While they had been in the enclave, it turned out, Sokka, Toph, Iroh, several refugees and apparently Suki of Kyoshi Island had had a rather harrowing experience crossing the gape between one side of the bay and Ba Sing Se. Catching up to them didn't actually do much, because, as it turned out, Azula had gotten a gigantic drill built, which she was using to burrow through the wall of the city.

Iroh had commented, "I must admit I am most impressed with your sister's enterprising nature, Prince Zuko," before they had begun discussing strategy and a means of stopping her. Sokka had been brilliant, getting the plans to the machine, figuring them out and determining the fastest way to bring the thing to a halt. A hasty conference among them gained Iroh the place as the uncle of the banished nobleman Lee, a somewhat disreputable merchant and tea connoisseur, Mushi.

They were all crowded into the monorail car, having finally managed to get inside the walls. Appa had decided that, since he wasn't needed inside the city, he was going to go back to join Shuga as much as possible. Zuko was distracted by Toph, who was trying very hard to infiltrate his personal space, and was happily getting her filthy feet all over his pants and anything else she could reach. Aang, as always unable to keep still, was bounding around the small space, looking far more like his lemur than one would think normally possible. His uncle was treating the whole expedition like a tourist vacation, and was ooing and ahhing out the window, and Katara was much the same. "Look, the inner wall. I can't believe we finally made it to Ba Sing Se in one piece," she commented.

Sokka, on the other hand, was being paranoid. He was quite good at it. "Hey don't jinx it! We could still be attacked by some giant, exploding Fire Nation spoon. Or find out the city's been submerged in an ocean full of killer shrimp."

"Giant, exploding Fire Nation spoon?" Zuko asked. "I know you don't think that much of the Fire Nation, but a spoon?"

"Sure," Sokka said, warming to the topic. "If you get it to hover, and then put a really big engine and stuff at the right part, they could use it to scoop up bits of the city and fling them around."

"Where does the exploding come in?" Zuko asked, with a morbid sort of fascination. Katara was mouthing, _Don't encourage him!_ behind her brother's back, but Zuko ignored her. Sokka in hysterics was an entertaining thing. It was completely unlike anything he'd ever seen before leaving the Fire Nation. His people may have prided themselves on their passionate nature, but they also prided themselves on a sophisticated and highly ritualised way of life. Sokka's armwaving was like the culmination of all the hysterics Zuko had never seen before he began living outside the Fire Nation.

The first time he'd seen this sort of overreaction, he'd been very taken aback, thinking perhaps the situation had to be more serious than he'd first assumed. It was a farmer, waving his arms and shouting in dismay over his herd of cow-pigs that had decided to break out of their pens and wander through his fields eating the crops. They hadn't been out long, had done almost no damage, and were docile, easy-to-herd animals. The man had, nonetheless, made a huge commotion over the matter.

Where someone of the Fire Nation would have been humiliated at being caught making such an unseemly display, this man had seemed almost . . . proud. Zuko had learned that the subtler ways of indicating concern or affection among his people were not the norm in the Earth Kingdom. While the people there tended to a much calmer and phlegmatic worldview, they also tended to react more to things in a visibly emotional way. The only emotion that it seemed valid to have an excess of in the Fire Nation, was anger.

Over time, Zuko had learned to first counterfeit, then to truly have reactions to things that were open and easy to read for those from outside the Fire Nation, but he still found the openness fascinating and a little indecent. Sokka was just so very open that Zuko couldn't help egging him on.

Sokka had launched himself into a lengthy diatribe on the matter of deadly exploding utensils, much to his sister's dismay, and even Uncle Iroh was looking a tad bemused at the creative and disturbing notions Sokka had come up with.

When they arrived at their destination, they were greeted by a woman with a disturbingly large smile on her face and an empty look in her eyes. "Hello, my name is Joo Dee. I have been given the great honour of showing the Avatar around Ba Sing Se. And you must be Sokka, Katara, and Toph. Welcome to our wonderful city. Shall we get started?" The introduction was rattled off with every indication of repetition to the point of creating a machine-like delivery. She sounded as though she had made the same speech a thousand times before.

"Yes," said Sokka. "We have information about the Fire Nation army that we need to deliver to the Earth King immediately."

It was as though the woman looked right past him and ignored everything in the sentence that didn't fit her tourguide paradigm. "Great, let's begin our tour. And then I'll show you to your new home here. I think you'll like it."

Sokka was incensed, while Katara and Aang looked confused. Zuko sighed, noting that Toph and his uncle had done the same. He knew, and they knew, that this woman was going to ignore anything that took her out of her set duties. There were people like that in every section of bureaucratic cities. People who would force any situation to return to their comfort zone before they were forced to go outside the normal parameters of their jobs. It was a failing of bureaucracy that the standardised nature of the beast meant very few people had to improvise anything more than a different place to get lunch when their favourite noodle shop was out of commission.

"Augh!" squawked Sokka, throwing his arms in the air. "Maybe you missed what I said. We need to talk to the King about the war, it's important." Katara and Aang both nodded sharply, supporting Sokka, while Zuko, Iroh and Toph all just sighed and waited to see who would win the confrontation.

"A copper piece on Joo Dee," Toph muttered to him.

Zuko shot her a sidelong look. "No bet. It's obvious he's going to lose."

Iroh looked reproachfully at both of them, but didn't actually say anything.

But what got their attention was the strange statement Joo Dee then made. "You're in Ba Sing Se now. Everyone is safe here."

"What?" Zuko said in disbelief. "So the fact that you're safe behind these walls, which you actually aren't since m- since the Fire Nation has giant drills to punch through the walls, means that it doesn't matter that there's a war going on out there and people are dying and being abused by the Fire Nation because 'everyone is safe here'?"

She stood, blinking through his rant, then her head tilted briefly as though something was resettling in her mind. Then she said, "Let's start our tour," and marched briskly off.

Toph shot him a look. "You knew she wasn't going to listen."

Zuko sighed. "I knew. I just . . ."

"She's dumb," Toph said straightforwardly.

"Now Miss Toph," his uncle said reprovingly, "Simply because she does not wish to have her view of things upset and is willing to cling to those beliefs in the face of significant opposing evidence does not make her . . . ah . . . dumb."

"What does it make her?" Toph demanded. "Because that's pretty dumb."

"Human," Iroh said, gently. "A great many people will refuse the evidence of their eyes, senses and experience in favour of continuing to believe and act as they always have. If they begin to believe otherwise, it is a step into the unknown, for what else do they now believe that is false?"

"I suppose," Zuko said reluctantly.

Toph shook her head. "Then they're dumb too. Lots of people are dumb. That's all there is to it."

"A desire for a comforting view of things is hardly the same as being dumb," Iroh chastised her.

Toph snorted and Zuko grinned down at her. "That's what I like about you, flower petal," he said. "Your hardheaded resistance to reason."

Naturally, she tripped him.

Iroh pointedly cleared his throat.

They followed Joo Dee in silence for a while. Then Zuko flicked her ear with a finger.

So at the next chance, she poked him, hard.

They kept it up long enough that Iroh finally shouldered his way between them in order to make them stop. Of course, when he got pulled into the discussion with Joo Dee about how to speed up access to the king of Ba Sing Se, the pair went back to poking each other. In the end, they were both absorbed enough in it that they missed Joo Dee's exit and the subsequent discussions of how to pass the time for the month of waiting ahead.

The weight of everyone staring at them finally made them both stop hissing and harassing each other. "What?" Toph demanded haughtily.

"Did either of you hear a word anyone said?" Katara demanded, hands on hips.

Zuko blinked at her. "Um . . . no, sorry?" he tried.

"We were just talking about what to do since we'll be stuck here for a month," Aang told them, having mercy on Zuko. Toph had no shame, so she didn't care.

"A month?" Zuko said, startled. Then he shook his head. "I really shouldn't be surprised," he said with a sigh. "I think we've all gotten a little spoiled by how many people just let Aang go anywhere because he's the Avatar."

"But . . . he's the Avatar," Katara said in surprise. "He's important. It's not like we'd expect to get in without him there."

"He is also a young boy," Iroh said solemnly. "And for those who place great important on appearances – powerful appearances – he will not carry the same importance as he would in other places."

Zuko nodded. "Besides, kings get a thousand petitioners a day. Every one of them claims they have a matter that's so important it needs the king's attention, and usually only a small fraction have something that requires that attention."

"But this is about winning the war-" Sokka started.

"But no one knows, not really, if that's true. For all they know, we're just a bunch of kids and one older man with a bad reputation. So we have to go through the official channels," Zuko interrupted. He sighed. "I don't think there's much we can do besides wait it out."

Toph plopped down onto a cushion. "He's got a point," she said. Then she snagged a pear and started munching.

Before the others could become too dejected, Iroh clapped his hands together and said, "Well! We are here now, we should make the best of it. I say we should go and explore the city without the assistance of the kindly Joo Dee."

Katara, Sokka and Aang agreed. Katara turned to Zuko. "Aren't you coming?" she asked.

"No," Zuko said. He looked around at the well-appointed, luxurious house and said. "Definitely not. I'm staying right here in comfort where I belong." He infused that last with enough jokingly overblown attitude that Katara only rolled her eyes and muttered something about arrogance and missing all the fun.

"If you're sure," Sokka said, doubtfully.

"I'm sure," Zuko assured him. "I'm heading for a bath in a real tub, with hot water, bath oils, clean, fluffy towels and a door I can wedge closed so I won't be interrupted by someone wanting to fondle his boomerang under the very thin pretext of sharpening it."

"You just get _mean_ when you haven't had a . . . hot bath recently," Sokka said, putting enough emphasis onto the words to imply right back why Zuko wanted privacy.

Aang just looked confused, until Iroh leaned over and said something in his ear, at which point he turned bright red and said, loudly, "Let's _go_ Sokka!" and dragged the boy in blue out the door, followed by a very amused Iroh and Katara.

"You're not going?" Zuko asked Toph as he gathered his pitiful collection of toiletries.

"Nope," Toph informed him. "Look at the _food_. I'm gonna get into the good stuff before Sokka gets back and eats it all."

"Good point," Zuko said, and collected a plate to take into the bathing room with him. Once inside he wedged the door shut, as he'd planned, in order to keep Toph, or anyone else, from barging in. Then he filled up the tub with water, heated it with his firebending, and happily settled in to enjoy being actually _clean._ Something he had taken for granted until he ran away from his uncle's ship and realised exactly how few and far between hot baths with all the amenities were when you were a homeless wanderer.

Sure he could heat the water in a lake or pond, but the effort of heating a small patch of water was enormous, as the heat rapidly dissipated into the rest of the water. It was very rare to find a small enough space with water in it, that was also clean enough to be worth bathing in, that he could effectively heat. He'd actually had more hot baths the last couple months travelling with the Avatar than he'd had in his years alone. Didn't mean he wasn't going to enjoy the moment to its fullest.

When he finally got out and redressed in the clothes he'd washed beforehand, the others had come back from their trip around the city, and Sokka was grousing about the Dai Li, censorship and waiting in the city. He was also making deep inroads in the food while Iroh watched in bemusement. "He's something to watch, isn't he?" Zuko said to his uncle, nodding his head in Sokka's direction.

"I did not know that one person as small as he is could eat so much," his uncle said.

"Hey!" Sokka said, "I'm a growing boy!"

Katara eyed him and said, "You're not as tall as Dad, but you _are_ as tall as Mom was . . ." she leaned forward and poked him in the side. "Yep. You're growing alright. Growing-"

"Not funny!" Sokka objected. "Why aren't you making fat jokes about anyone else?"

"Because you're the only one eating enough for three people, Snoozles," Toph pointed out, acerbically.

While the others squabbled, Iroh turned to his nephew and said, "Would you like to go for a walk, nephew?"

"I would, thank you, Uncle."

They left, making their way slowly through the streets, eventually making their way from the upper ring, through the middle ring and eventually into the lower ring. Most of the time was spent in a comfortable silence, occasionally trading a comment on some point of interest in the city's architecture or art. As they passed the checkpoint into the lower ring, Zuko asked his uncle, "Uncle? Why are we here? Is there something important we need to do here?"

"Ah, Lee," Iroh said with a smile. "Patience, and you shall see." Zuko looked askance at the man, but trusting in his wisdom, just let his uncle lead him through the streets. "Ah! Here we are!" Iroh declared.

Zuko looked around and didn't see anything interesting. It was a flea market. "Are we meeting someone at the market, Uncle?"

"No! We are here to shop!" his uncle cried in delight, hurrying to a vendor selling bric-a-brac wares. "Look at this little cat-owl statue," Iroh said with a grin. "Don't you think it would look perfect on that little end-table in the living room?"

"Uncle!" Zuko moaned. He'd forgotten the man's tendencies to shopping.

His uncle waved a dismissive hand. "Live a little, Nephew!"

Sighing, Zuko trailed after the man while he shopped and tried to buy everything in the market, claiming the junk there was bargains just waiting to be made. His uncle bought a sort of shoulder bag just to carry everything in. It took an eternity, and Zuko had to argue his uncle down from a Tsunghi horn to a flute. Not only that, but somehow, _he_ wound up carrying his uncle purchases after the man had played frail, elderly gentleman so that Zuko _had_ to carry them or be practically stoned by the locals for being a bad nephew.

He was shocked, then, when someone grabbed him by the shoulder, sending him sprawling into the street. "You firebending monster!"

Zuko rolled quickly to his feet and found himself face to face with someone he'd never expected to see again. "Jet?" he said, surprised. There wasn't much time for shock, however, as Jet was as intent on taking his head off then, as he was back in the woods of the Earth Kingdom. As the hooked swords swung at him, Zuko ducked and wove out of the way, ignoring Jet's taunts that he should use firebending.

A frantic tuck and roll put him next to a weapons merchant. Grabbing two swords off the table, he was just barely able to block Jet's next swing. "Come on, I know what you are! Why don't you just give in and bend me out of the way like you did last time?" the self-proclaimed freedom fighter jeered.

"Maybe because, even if I _was_ a firebender, I wouldn't need it to take you on," snarled Zuko. He spun, his borrowed blade whistling through the air and slicing open Jet's tunic, even as the other danced out of the way, using his hooked blades to yank one of Zuko's out of his hand. Prepared this time for the move, Zuko simply slid under Jet's following swing and came up behind him in time to catch his sword, swinging it at his opponent's unprotected back.

Jet was able to turn and catch the blade on one of his own, swinging his second hand up to catch Zuko's second blade on its downswing. All four swords tangled in a clash of steel that rang through the marketplace. Dimly, he was aware of his uncle pleading with Jet that a mistake was being made, but he couldn't afford to spare any concentration.

"Drop your weapons!" came a shout. Zuko recognised the Dai Li from their uniforms and started to lower his swords. He brought them up again when Jet refused to submit, and blocked the swing that would have gutted him. "I said drop your weapons!"

A moment later, they were both encased in stone. Zuko took the moment to look around and catch his breath. Jet was still struggling. "Arrest him!" he shouted, pointing at Zuko. "He's Fire Nation nobility!"

"This boy has made a terrible mistake," Iroh pleaded with the officer. "My nephew and I are but visitors to your city."

One of the vendors Iroh had lavished money on spoke up. "These two were just here, shopping, when that man," he pointed at Jet, "Grabbed the older one's nephew and just started attacking him, calling him a firebender."

A mutter of agreement ran around the market. "It's true," added another. "We saw the whole thing."

"Come along, son," said the officer, as they pulled Jet towards a nearby wagon they had hastily modified with earthbending into a prisoner transport.

"No!" shouted Jet. "You don't understand! He's Fire Nation! You have to believe me!"

One of the Dai Li gestured at Zuko as Jet was being loaded into the transport, freeing him from his stone restraints. Zuko immediately collected his borrowed swords, returning them to the weapon vendor. "Thank you," he said. "I'm sorry about taking them like that."

The man shook his head. "It's alright, young man. You had reason." Then he looked hopeful. "I don't suppose you're in the market for swords?"

Zuko grinned a little. "Sorry, no. I have a pair at home. These _are_ nice, though," he told the man.

Which was why his uncle insisted on adding them to his purchases.

On the way back, after having guilted Zuko into carrying all the junk he'd purchased, Iroh asked, "How did you meet this Jet fellow, Nephew?" With a sigh, Zuko recounted the initial meeting with the other boy. When he'd finished, his uncle shook his head sadly. "It is a pity that one so young and so talented should have become so bitter."

They made their way back to the house finally, to be greeted by Sokka's enthusiastic appraisal of Iroh's purchases and Toph's disappointment that she'd missed the fight. One look from Katara dissuaded Zuko of the notion of inciting a fight with Toph to 'make it up to her.' Aang had apparently worn himself out from his constant buzzing around the room and missed all the excitement.

Zuko was awakened that night by something crawling into his bed. Before he overreacted, he recognised the scent of Katara's hair. Then she punched him. "Ow! What was that about?"

"Don't go off and nearly get yourself killed again!" she hissed vehemently at him.

"I wasn't nearly killed!" he protested.

"Hmmph," she said as she draped herself over him. "You're just going to stay put where I can keep an eye on you."

"But-"

"Shush."

"Sokka-"

"Quiet."

"Uncle-"

She put a hand over his mouth to muffle him.

Around her fingers he tried again. "Mmmph."

"Sleeping," she informed him.

He gave up.


	12. Ba Sing Se: Events

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: In this story is a quote from Kerry on http : / / abderian dot net / kerry / Look at her Political Universe series, the first story, "The Proper Punishment is Never Caramel Brownies", halfway down. I'm slightly misquoting what Chakotay says to Janeway's mother. Also, if you're a Janeway/Chakotay 'shipper and you enjoy goofy fun, this is a great series. Actually, Kerry's a great JetC 'shipper author generally. She's hysterically funny. In my opinion, anyhow. I'm still trying to figure out how to work into one of my fics somewhere that scene where Janeway and B'Elanna have clearly strangled a large predator with a bra.

* * *

Zuko woke the next morning to the pleasant feeling of Katara curled up next to him, her head on his chest. This was followed by the much less pleasant feeling that came from seeing his uncle and Toph's heads peeking around the doorframe with matching evil grins on their scheming faces. "No," he told them.

His uncle just grinned and made vaguely encouraging hand signals. Toph smirked in a way that just made his blood turn to ice. "I wonder how Snoozles is sleeping," she said wickedly.

"Now, Toph," his uncle told her, "It does not do to interfere with the course of love."

She pouted, but said, "Fine. I won't wake Sokka up."

"Thank you, uncle," Zuko said gratefully. Then he glared. "And would you stop going on about love? She's just being cranky and using me as a heat pack."

Toph and his uncle made simultaneous and very similar snorts. Unfortunately, all the activity woke Katara up. "Morning," she said to him.

"Hi," he told her, glancing significantly at the door. When she followed his gaze, her blue eyes went wide, she turned quite red, and said, "Eep!"

"You're right," Toph said contemplatively. "I won't tell Sokka. Leaving the fear that I might tell Sokka hanging over their heads is way more fun."

That was the last straw. Katara was awake now, so he didn't have to stay quiet for her sake, and Zuko lunged across the floor at Toph, who scampered off laughing. "I'll see you outside, Flower Petal!" he called as he chased her. "You, me and we'll see who walks away laughing then!"

Vaguely he heard Katara shouting at them not to mess up the garden, but he was more interested in wiping that grin off Toph's face. It wasn't until they came back inside, bruised, bleeding and Zuko triumphantly carrying a kicking Toph draped over his shoulder that he realised he was very lucky the garden had high walls. There was no telling the reaction there would have been if he'd exposed himself as a firebender.

They came back in to the ridiculous sight of Sokka and Aang, putting on airs, trying to pretend they were nobles . . . or . . . something. "Good evening, Mr. Sokka Watertribe. Ms. Katara Watertribe. Lord Momo of the Momo Dynasty, your Momo-ness."

Zuko hastily put Toph down. She needed to 'see' as much of this as she could.

"Avatar Aang, how you do go on ," Sokka replied.

Then Aang bowed, or something. Then Sokka bowed, apparently trying to outdo Aang. They kept it up until they managed to smack their heads together.

"You're wearing a curtain," Zuko said to Aang, more for Toph's benefit than anything else.

"What are you two doing?" Toph asked, sounding about as bewildered as Zuko felt at the display.

Katara said, very dryly, "They're trying to prove to Iroh that they can be sophisticated enough to break into the party the Earth King is having for his bear at the palace tonight."

Zuko looked at his uncle. "No. Absolutely not. I hate those things."

"You and me both, Weepy," Toph said. "But I think you, me and Pops are the only ones who're going to be able to get in without trouble. Maybe Sweetness. She actually has manners and stuff."

"Hey!" Sokka said indignantly. "What's wrong with my manners?"

"I thought we went over this at the Northern Water Tribe," Zuko told him. "Or can you not remember that far back?"

"I . . . uh . . . oh." Sokka blinked. "Right. That was . . . bad."

"What happened?" Toph asked, interestedly.

Zuko gave her a look. "You have enough ammunition against the rest of us. I'm not telling you just to let you harass Sokka more than you do."

"You're no fun," she groused at him.

"I'm just nicer than you."

"Nice?" she asked. "Look at what you've done to me. I'm just a little blind girl."

Zuko rolled his eyes at her. "Please, I'm immune to guilt. You're about as helpless as a skunk bear." He paused, then leaned forward and sniffed dramatically. "But you do smell like one."

"Why you-"

"She's got more manners than me?" Sokka asked, pointing at Toph.

It distracted her from trying to kill Zuko again, which was good, because she really was a hair-puller when her bending failed. "I learned proper society behaviour and chose to leave it. You never learned anything. And frankly, it's a little too late."

After much discussion, it was agreed that Zuko, Toph, Iroh and Katara would go to the party. Iroh as Zuko and Toph's grandfather, and acting as a chaperone to Katara and Zuko, who would be pretending to be betrothed. "Don't think I don't know what you're doing," Zuko muttered to his uncle as the man dragged the three kids all over in search of 'Just the right outfits.'

"Why, nephew, whatever do you mean?" the man asked with a damnable twinkle in his eye.

"I mean," Zuko grated out as Katara flitted by, trying on shades of green and white, "That you're trying to set me up with Katara, and I don't appreciate being handled."

"Miss Katara is a lovely young lady," his uncle told him, then held up a tunic to himself, preening in a mirror. "You two are an excellent fit, and I do wish you would stop denying it."

"Just because everyone wants to see romance somewhere doesn't mean she's interested, and it doesn't mean I'm interested," Zuko hissed at him. The last thing he needed was someone overhearing the conversation and taking it the wrong way. Say, Toph. Or worse, Katara. "We're just friends, we've already talked about it, and we both agreed we never saw each other that way."

"When was this?" his uncle asked, thrusting a formal robe at Zuko.

Zuko sighed. "We were at the Northern Air Temple and some people were living there. Teo and Aang kept going on about how exotic Katara's hair loopies are, and she told me some of the girls though Sokka and I were . . . um . . ." he trailed off, not sure how to say what Katara had said without sounding unduly self-aggrandising.

"There is no shame in knowing, and accepting, that you look good in the eyes of others, Nephew," his uncle told him. "So, you told her about this conversation with Aang and this Teo, and she told you about the discussions she'd had with the girls?"

"Yes, and we agreed that we didn't see each other that way, and that was that."

"You started noticing her then, didn't you?" his uncle told him, refusing to take the point.

Zuko made a noise of disgust and stomped off, trying to find some nice formal wear that wouldn't cut his circulation off somewhere.

They eventually got clothes for all of them and spent the rest of the afternoon stealing an invitation to copy, copying the invitation, then bullying Momo into returning the invitation they'd stolen in the first place.

He'd gotten ready quickly, but he'd never been any good at getting his hair into any semblance of formality. It was precisely what servants were for. It was also one of the reasons he loved being Lee, the ordinary itinerant traveller. He never had to fuss with his hair beyond washing it and keeping tangles out. Now he was tugging it up, pulling it out, tugging it up, pulling it out, the whole process was incredibly annoying. Worse yet, he was going to have to ask his uncle for help, and how humiliating was that going to be?

He was banging his head on the vanity where the mirror was when Katara came in and said, "You need any help?"

"I . . ." She was dressed in a formal kimono of pale grey with edging in a greenish shade of grey. The embroidery and detailing was in cream. Her hair was up in an incredibly complex, formal arrangement, with some sort of architecture holding it up and a rose artfully planted in the centre. Between the clothes, the hair and the makeup, she looked like any noblewoman of good breeding. She was even moving like one, and Zuko found himself suddenly and forcibly aware of the fact that Katara – warrior, determined, annoying, comforting Katara – was a really pretty girl. Aware that he was flustered, and not liking it at all, Zuko reached for the only control that never failed him. Courtly manners. "I would be most pleased, my lady," he said, and bowed formally over her hand.

She blushed, stuttered, and Zuko instantly felt better now that he wasn't the only one acting like a moron. "I . . . uh . . . you were banging your head on the table," she said a little lamely, "So I thought you might be having trouble with something."

He sighed inwardly. Point to Katara. He'd already been acting like a moron before she interrupted. "Please. Can you fix my hair," he pleaded. "Before I have to embarrass myself and ask Uncle?"

"Sit down," she said. He did, and she quickly and efficiently brushed his hair out, smoothed it into place, and had it in a nice Earth Kingdom braid at the back of his neck, and one of their silly hats in place. Through the whole process, he was keenly aware of her hands on him and put it down to the fact that she wasn't an anonymous servant, trained in unobtrusive behaviour, but his friend. He wasn't going to give his uncle any more reason to claim he and Katara were anything other than friends.

"How sweet! I recall when my wife used to do that for me," his uncle said from the door. Zuko tried to bang his head on the vanity again, and Katara grabbed the back of his tunic pulling sharply so that any movement forward choked him.

"You mess up the hair and I'm not helping you fix it," she told him. "He's teasing you. Deal with it."

"He's not teasing," Zuko groused as he followed her and his uncle down the stairs. "He's completely serious. That's the problem."

Toph was waiting at the bottom of the stairs looking polished, but with a sort of ruffled air to her. "You look pretty," Zuko offered. "I'd better," Toph groused. "Katara made me take a bath."

"Sometime I have to take you to a hot spring," Zuko told her. "You'd love it. It's all rocky, and the water's heated by underground lava flows."

"If you can find me a bath that includes rocks and lava, I'm willing to give it a shot," she told him, agreeably. "I look okay? Katara didn't do that thing where you make your friends look ugly to make yourself look better?"

"No," Zuko told her. "And I don't think Katara would anyway. Not unless something happened and she suddenly became deranged."

"Hmmph," Toph told him. "That's good. Still, she'd better not be poaching my potential future husband."

By then, they'd moved into the front of their little group, and Zuko heard his uncle having a sudden coughing fit behind him. "Uncle?" he asked, turning around. "Are you okay?"

"Just fine," the man said, clearing his throat. "To what, exactly, are you referring, young Toph?"

Zuko tuned it all out for the carriage ride to the palace, preferring to focus on recreating the court persona he'd cultivated during his childhood. This wasn't going to be just Lao Bei Fong, with the excuse that he was travelling with the uncouth Avatar and his friends. This would be straight court.

They made it into the party without trouble, at which point Zuko discovered that this might not be as normal a court as he'd thought. At the far end of the room, seated at the dais, was a . . . bear. Zuko squinted at it. "What is that?" he asked. "It looks a little like a kind of bear but . . ."

Katara shrugged beside him. "The party's in honour of the bear. And the invitation just said, 'bear'. Not platypus bear, skunk bear or any other kind of normal bear. Just . . . 'bear'."

"This place is weird," Toph muttered.

They started circulating, Toph being fully as arrogant as could be hoped, Zuko doing much the same, while his uncle played slightly dotty nobleman, as he always did. Katara looked distinctly uncomfortable with the whole production. "Why is everyone so . . ." she trailed off as she searched for a good word.

"Nasty," Toph offered. "They're competing with each other. Whoever has the most prestige, whether through money, fame or rank wins. It's a whole thing," Toph said. "You have to bluff 'em."

Zuko pointed out one set of snooty nobles and said, "You see them? They're trying to make up in attitude what they don't have in rank. They all have a lot of money, you can see that by how expensive, yet completely tasteless their clothes are."

"Those are really high quality jewels," Toph added. She twitched a little, and one of them jerked as his heavily jewelled turban did the same. "Yep. Really high quality."

Zuko pointed out another group. "Those are some people with really high rank. They don't have any money, but they can probably trace their noble family lines back for a hundred generations. That kind of thing has a lot of cache. Unfortunately, their rank means that they can't work, so they can't make the money they don't have."

Katara frowned. "Is that why they're so . . . arrogant, but everything looks out of fashion?"

"You're getting it," Zuko said.

"Does that mean the relaxed people over there," she indicated the group she meant, "are rich and have a lot of power or rank or something?"

Zuko looked. "Expensive, but more or less tasteful and relaxed? Yes. The ones that are relaxed and don't look like a million gold are the ones that are here because they're famous, but don't have rank or a lot of money," he added. "They don't have anything to lose if they make a less-than-powerful showing, so they can afford to have a good time."

An oily voice interrupted. "I see you are showing your delightful acquaintance around for the first time." They turned, and found themselves face to face with a man in a robe of such dark green it was almost black, with gold edging. His hair was slicked back, and he had a carefully coiffed moustache and tiny little goatee. "I am Long Feng. A cultural minister to the king."

Zuko bowed, then said, "I am Lee Pao Ai, and this is my younger sister, Ju Pao Ai." He took Katara's hand, kicked Toph before she found a way to protest again that her name had to mean 'flower', and said, "My betrothed is from the provinces. Kwa mai Sing has never been to Ba Sing Se, let alone to court. She is therefore somewhat . . . unpractised in its culture."

Katara weakly smiled.

His uncle arrived, "Ah, Lee! I am most pleased to have found you. This is quite a gathering," he smiled genially at Long Feng, but his eyes were very sharp and Zuko was suddenly doubly glad his uncle was there. "I am Mushi Pao Ai. Lee and Ju's grandfather."

"Grandfather," Zuko still twitched as he recalled the last person he'd called that – his grandfather Azulon had always terrified him. "This is Long Feng."

"The lead cultural advisor to the king," his uncle said, showing he'd gathered rather a lot of information in the short time since they'd arrived. "As always, Lee, you are excellent at finding the seat of power."

It was all Zuko could do not to hiss, and the way Katara and Toph both stiffened slightly told him they'd caught the message as well. Long Feng wasn't just some random minister. He was probably the power behind the throne. Suddenly, Toph pulled out the faint delicate flower voice she'd used to get them all in trouble the first time they'd met in the Bei Fong's garden. "Lee? I feel unwell. Could you help me to a seat?"

Glancing at each other, Katara and Zuko immediately fawned over Toph, 'helping' her away from Long Feng. Once they were out of sight, Zuko asked quietly, "What's going on?"

She just led them away to where Sokka and Aang dressed as waiters. "This is bad," Zuko said, feeling dread. The feeling was compounded when Joo Dee appeared out of the crowd and demanded, "What are you doing here? You have to leave immediately, or we'll all be in terrible trouble."

Joo Dee started trying to herd them all out of the room, but Sokka was obstinate, then Aang's tray of drinks went flying all over one of the noblewomen attending. Zuko felt his stomach start to drop into his feet. When Sokka told Aang to distract people while he tried to find the king, he could only watch in a sort of bemused horror.

"Do something," Toph hissed at him.

"Like what?" he hissed back. Aang had already rapidly garnered the attention of everyone there with his bending display.

It was too late. They were surrounded and carted off by earthbenders within moments. The discovery they made in that room with Long Feng was horrifying. It wasn't that the king was being kept ignorant of the outside world and Long Feng expected the war to ignore Ba Sing Se that so disturbed him, it was Joo Dee.

Or rather, it was the girl who claimed to be the same Joo Dee as the one they'd had as a 'guide' for the last couple days. Because she wasn't Joo Dee. Or rather, she wasn't the same Joo Dee. Who both girls truly were was a mystery, but something was deeply wrong. They allowed themselves to be tossed out and headed back to the house delegated to them, but everyone was concerned by the evening's events.

By general accord, they all pretty much silently prepared for bed and went their own ways. The whole evening had been a failure and no one knew what to do next.

Zuko didn't even bother closing his door. He just sat up waiting. As he'd expected, Katara showed up the moment Sokka's snores began to resound in the halls. He shook his head as she shoved him over and burrowed into him. "How does Sokka not wake himself up?" he asked her, as he let her snuggle.

"Sometimes he does," Katara told him, her voice muffled by his sternum.

"Are you okay?"

She sighed, gustily. "I don't know. I just . . . Long Feng scared me, and Joo Dee . . . I don't even . . ."

"I know," Zuko murmured. "What did they do to the first one, and why?"

"She was supposed to keep us quiet," Katara said. "She wasn't doing her job, so they . . . they did something bad to her."

Zuko shivered a little himself, because it really was frightening. "We'll figure something out," he told her. "We have to," he added, a little bleakly.

"We will," she assured him, then kissed his cheek.

Zuko blinked at her. "What was that for?"

"For being so nice all evening, for explaining all the weird court stuff, for not making me feel dumb for not figuring that out on my own," she paused, and Zuko fancied he could feel her blush when she mumbled, "And for being all courtly and stuff when I showed up to do your hair. It made me-" she sort of mumbled the rest into his shoulder.

"Made you what?" Zuko asked. "I didn't hear that."

Katara made a sort-of exasperated noise when she said, "It made me feel like a princess or something, okay? Like I was special." Then she started to scramble away, no doubt to return to her room. Zuko wasn't going to let her leave like that.

He grabbed her hand and yanked her back. "What do you mean?" he asked. "That's not even the correct form for addressing a princess."

She redoubled her efforts to get away. "Fine. Make fun of me."

"I'm not," he said, completely bewildered.

Katara turned back around and he found himself the object of intense scrutiny, from about one inch away from his face. Just as suddenly she stopped, turning back around and curling back up against him. "You'd better not be," she told him grumpily.

"I still have no idea what you mean," Zuko told her. "I was just . . . you . . ." Something about the dark made him honest. "You looked really pretty. Like you were a real noblewoman. You wear it well, you know," he told her. "I just . . . it was like instinct, okay?"

"Oh," she said in a small voice. Then, "You thought I looked pretty? Like a noblewoman pretty?"

"You always look pretty," Zuko said, exasperated with the whole production now. "You don't look any less pretty than noblewomen do, you just dress differently." He sat up enough so that he could glare down at her. "Can we stop this so at least I can get some sleep?"

"You think I always look pretty?"

"One, I thought we went over this back at the Northern Temple. Yes, you're pretty. Two, I'm going to make you go away if you don't start with being quiet so I can sleep," Zuko told her.

She settled back down.

Although he could have sworn her heard her mumble, "You think I'm pretty."

The next morning, all those late night confessions in the darkness seemed far enough away that he decided he wasn't going to even go there. Instead, he agreed with the others that they should take a day to wind down. They'd been training and working and struggling and searching for months, and they all needed to take a day or two to relax. Once they'd done that, they'd decide what to do next and where to go.

Zuko heard Katara and Toph say something about a spa, and decided not to ask. It was fairly clear this was going to be another abortive attempt on Katara's part to bond with Toph on a girly level. Sokka went exploring, Aang declared he was going in search of the zoo he'd heard so much about and uncle was being mysterious, so Zuko left him to it.

Instead, he took the time alone in the walled garden to meditate in peace and quiet, then practice his firebending. He'd just finished having a delightful hot bath and redressing when first Sokka, then Katara and Toph and finally Aang all returned. For a while, they all revelled in it being just them without the adult they'd picked up in Iroh, but Aang gradually got more and more annoying as he chattered on about the zoo, and Katara had somehow gotten to Toph enough that they were both being eerily girly.

By a silent mutual accord, Zuko and Sokka fled the house, wandering aimlessly through the streets of Ba Sing Se. Cheerfully harassing each other about the night before and Sokka's silly uniform as opposed to Zuko's emasculating formal wear and a discussion about which of the noblewomen at the party had been easier on the eyes, they wended their way through the streets of the city.

Zuko was just about to prod Sokka again about his impromptu haiku competition earlier that day, when Sokka silenced him and pointed at a bunch of boys. He turned to listen, hearing, "So then the old man is all, 'It is usually best to admit mistakes when they occur, and to seek to restore honor,' then old man Ping shouts at us the way he always does, and he gets all, 'But not this time. Run!'" The boy is laughing. "And he ran away just like we did. He even covered for us with the constable. He may have been fat, but he was pretty cool for an old guy!"

Amazingly, the boys even said which way they'd seen him going last, and Zuko, now curious about where Iroh was going, went with Sokka to the marketplace and picked up Iroh's trail. They found a path, leading up a hill to a tree. On the ground, before the tree, Zuko spotted a piece of parchment. A sketch was on it.

"What's he doing?" Sokka asked, baffled.

Zuko hissed. "I can't believe I forgot," he murmured.

"Forgot what?" Sokka asked.

"Lu Ten," Zuko said, by way of explanation.

"Who . . ." Sokka suddenly looked up. "Your cousin? The one who . . . who died here." They both watched as his uncle began to softly sing a lullaby Zuko recalled from his own childhood.

Zuko nodded absently, seeing his uncle's facade of kindness and geniality, unaffected by all that had gone on in his life crack. He heard the man's voice tremble as he mourned the son he'd lost so long ago, and yet so recently. "He'd mounted the walls, trying to . . . I don't know. I heard Uncle once tell my mother he'd been trying to prove something. There were too many up there and he . . . I only know that he was pushed off the wall. He fell and . . ."

Sokka was looking at him with deep sympathy. "That why you went so nuts at the Northern Temple, wasn't it?"

"I saw his body," Zuko said, his own voice cracking. "He was . . . it was horrible, and uncle-"

"Go up there," Sokka told him.

Zuko flinched. "I don't . . . he would have asked if he wanted me there. Lu Ten was his son. I'm just-"

"The guy he thinks of as a son," Sokka told him. "And you miss him, don't you? You have a right to mourn your cousin too." When Zuko continued to balk, Sokka dragged him over to where Iroh continued to softly murmur at his makeshift altar.

The older man looked up, surprised to see them both. "Sokka? Zuko? What are you-"

"We were curious," Sokka said, interrupting, "And now Zuko's going to join you, because I'm pretty sure he'll cry if he doesn't."

His uncle looked . . . oddly happy. "Zuko? Do you wish to join me?"

He'd never been able to cry over his cousin. The servants had been spies for his father, and both Azula and Ozai had called those tears a weakness. He'd never dared, but his uncle's tear-streaked face made him ask – just to be sure, "Can I? I mean, I can leave if you don't want . . ."

"Please. Stay."

With that, he joined his uncle, kneeling and remembering the boy who'd died. Zuko glanced briefly back at Sokka, as his friend headed back towards the path, catching his eye and mouthing, "Thank you."

They knelt together, talked, remembered Lu Ten and shared their happy memories of him. Sokka had long since left, and they were alone on that little hillock.

Zuko and his uncle were both so distracted by their memories and the chance to share their mourning for Lu Ten, that neither noticed the attack until it had started. They were a great team, but Zuko was used to working with a different team, and his uncle kept expecting Zuko to fight as a traditional firebender, making them both off balance with each other. They were overwhelmed by the earthbenders – the Dai Li, now that Zuko was making note of their uniforms – and his last view was of his uncle calling his name in what sounded like fear. "Zuko!"

* * *

Post-fic note: Yes, yes, I'm ducking the thrown objects.


	13. Ba Sing Se: Beginning All Over Again

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Happy Boxing Day everybody. I give you the last chapter of Airbender's Child: Earth. Soon to be followed up with Airbender's Child: Fire. I'm not really sure how I feel about how this turned out. I got in all the plot points I wanted, but this is awfully abrupt. Also, I will attempt to answer any questions you have about what actually happened in the next 'book', but keep in mind this is totally from Zuko's perspective, so it's not like I can say what went on when he wasn't there. The boy ain't psychic. So, I hope you guys have fun . . . or at least think this is a good chapter. Yeah, it's a little short for how long you've been waiting, but that's all there is to it.

* * *

He had to be ill. It was the only explanation.

There was a sense of darkness. Disorientation and spinning lights. Voices murmured out of the darkness. Some loud, some soft, but every voice added to his confusion. ". . . It seems the boy Jet was right, he is a firebender . . ."

". . . It's alright. There's no need to worry. You're a simple farmboy. You've done nothing wrong. Just relax . . ."

". . . New orders . . ."

Zuko longed to hear the kind voices of his friends through what had to be delirium . . .

A sharp voice, female, hard and so familiar cut through his haze. It made him think of lightning, cutting across the night sky. In its wake were dragons. Red and blue dragons clashing and fighting over him. There was another one, white scales around its head giving the impression of sideburns and a beard, heavier than the others; it spoke with a gentle fatherly voice, telling him not to listen to the red dragon. Zuko felt drawn to the blue one who sometimes spoke in the voice of a girl, gentle and kind, but raging like an ocean storm as she fought the red one with the force and power of the seas. Sometimes it spoke in the voice of a boy, a young man, clever and kind who fought the red dragon with wits and body unlike the girl's more blatant power.

". . . Your generous sister . . ."

". . . prove your competence . . ."

Friends? What was he thinking of? He had no friends, the few who cared at all for him he could not call friends.

The red dragon had turned and brought fire down on the heads of the blue dragon and its bearded counterpart. They lay struggling on the ground, and Zuko wanted to help them somehow. He wanted to run to their aid, but he couldn't. He was helpless. Useless. It was all he had ever been. Second best to the second child. It was his fate.

Every time he opened his eyes, looked away from the dream it was to darkness and spinning lights, the whispers echoing in his mind. They were doing something to him. Changing something in him and he couldn't tell what. Everything was a blur.

". . . never better than your sister . . ."

". . . never left the palace until now . . ."

Snatches of memory flew past him, and Zuko clung to those he could, letting the rest slip away rather than losing everything by trying to hold on to too much. White fur and a gentle rumbling sound that comforted. A male voice, laughing through the clash of sparring blades. A girl's voice and dirty feet. A boy's delighted shouts floating on the air. The voice of a young woman, murmuring softly in his ear as he inhaled the scent of her hair. An older man, holding him closely and forgiving him for everything.

He let the rest fly away into the darkness because if he clung to too many memories he would lose them all. These few – six only – he could cling to. He could defend them and keep them safe with him. Hopefully it would be enough.

Then it all faded into silence and Zuko let those memories he clung to sink slowly back into his mind, gently resting there, safe finally. He could rest.

An unknowable time later, he opened his eyes again, and was greeted, not by darkness and lights, but by a stone ceiling overhead, green blankets above and sheets below on a bed. The room was practically empty but for the bed, and Zuko looked around, confused. It was nothing like his room in the . . .

The door slammed open, startling him and making his heart pound.

"Hello, Zuzu," said his sister. "I'm so glad you're better." She oozed saccharine from every pore as she said it, and he couldn't help but feel she could have cared less.

"Azula," he replied. "What's going on? Where am I?"

She settled beside him on the bed with her usual catlike grace. "Why brother, you've been dreadfully ill. For a while none of us were even certain if you'd make it. Mai, in particular, was quite . . . concerned."

"Mai?" Zuko asked. His head felt as though it were stuffed with wool. Something felt wrong, and he couldn't tell what.

Azula rolled her eyes. "You're even worse than you were before," she told him with amused exasperation. "Mai? My friend? Your girlfriend?"

"My . . . my girlfriend?" Zuko repeated. Yes. That was right. The fog in his head was starting to clear. Mai was his girlfriend. They had been seeing each other since they were fourteen. He and Azula were in Ba Sing Se together because Father had assigned her the job of bringing the city down. She had requested his presence because she wanted to help him finally succeed at impressing their father.

The story all fit together and he had no reason to disbelieve it, but something felt off. Zuko shrugged it away. He had been ill, that was all. That was where the rattled and dazed feeling was coming from. Once he was completely better everything would settle.

He let Azula pull him out of the bed and took the clothes she thrust at him and dressed slowly after she'd left, warning him she'd be waiting outside and not to make her do it for too long. They walked down the hall together in silence, Zuko feeling no small bit lost. Then they walked into a small dining room, and there were Mai and Ty Lee. Zuko smiled hesitantly at them, and was a little shocked when Mai walked right up to him and kissed him.

It felt . . . odd. Not wrong, just . . . odd. Like it was the first time they were doing this. But she'd been his girlfriend for two years. Surely they'd kissed before? Zuko firmly shook the thought off and wrapped his arms around her waist and deepened the kiss. It wouldn't be fair to Mai for him to take out his uncertainties on her. And besides, how would he feel if he pushed her away and everything and then his memories came back?

She reacted with surprise, then suddenly pushed him away. "Zuko! You know that I don't like doing that in front of people."

"I . . ." he shook his head a little. "I'm sorry Mai. Everything's just . . . it feels blurry right now. I'm not remembering things well."

Her face softened a little. "Well, I suppose I can forgive you. This time."

He smiled thankfully at her. "I appreciate that." He turned to Ty Lee. "How have you been?" he asked in a subtle bid for more information to fill in the blanks in his head.

"I'm great," she said enthusiastically. "I mean, I was really worried while you were sick, your aura was all an ugly sort of green, but it's looking much better now, so I'm great."

So Azula had been telling the truth about his being sick that was a relief . . . What was he thinking? This was his sister and she loved him. Why would he think she'd lie?

Azula always . . .

Zuko refocused his attention on Ty Lee's stories about the king's bear and how cute it was. Mai interjecting dryly that if she'd wanted to shovel animal dung, she'd've become an animal trainer. The conversation was amiable, although Zuko couldn't do more than interject a word or two. He'd had the least interesting time out of the three of them, anyhow. While Azula had gotten special tutors and training, Zuko had just gotten someone to make sure he didn't accidentally set himself on fire with his bending. After all, Azula was a prodigy. Zuko was just . . . able to make fire.

So while Ty Lee ran off to the circus, Mai travelled in diplomatic circles with her parents and Azula got special training, privileges and opportunities to become the skilled heir to the throne their father had named her, Zuko had just lived at the palace, a useless appendage much to the Fire Lord's disgust. Azula had been kind to arrange for him to come with her so that he could have the chance to prove to their father that he was of some real use, not destined to be a failure like Uncle Iroh.

Suddenly Zuko realised that Azula had begun to speak of her plan to capture the Avatar, their uncle and take over Ba Sing Se as well. In the end, his role was small, just providing support for Azula when she took down the Avatar and his friends, but if his sister reported he had been unflinching in the face of battle, perhaps he'd finally be seen as worth something in his father's eyes.

"So I've had the Dai Li take the waterbending girl captive, and we'll just wait until the Avatar and his little friends come to rescue the girl. Then we'll take them all," Azula declared with a delighted smile.

Something in it made him want to shiver, but Zuko sternly repressed the urge. He had to prove he was capable. It wouldn't happen if he was thought squeamish about doing what was necessary. As they prepared to go, Zuko began hunting for his blades. His dao blades were missing, and he began to feel frantic. Something wasn't right. He always took great care with them.

"Something wrong, Zuzu?" Azula smirked from the doorway.

Zuko hissed in annoyance with himself. "Where are my swords? I can't believe-"

"We're trying to break you of that ridiculous habit, remember?" his sister said, rolling her eyes. "You're a firebender. You're superior to everyone, particularly those silly nonbenders running around with their hunks of metal. They're not here."

"Oh," Zuko said, the feeling that something was wrong intensifying. "Right."

Azula was right, of course. It was among the first lessons he'd been taught when he first began to learn bending. A firebender had no need of any weapons but his bending. It was a basic tenet of firebending. It was just this foggy feeling in his head. If he could just find a way to shake it. He opened his mouth to suggest he should sit this out after all, then closed it. Telling Azula that would just expose that he was too weak to be any use at all.

"Are you alright, Zuzu?" his sister asked.

"Fine," he told her, giving himself a mental shake. "I'm fine."

They made their way down, through the catacombs, and Zuko watched, out of sight, as Azula taunted the waterbender. Even with the limited presence of her element, the waterbender was a sight to behold as she battled Azula across the space.

Suddenly, the wall burst inward, and the Avatar, as Azula had described him arrived, accompanied by his uncle. The battle suddenly shifted in the girl's favour, as she had the support of his uncle and the small boy with a bald, tattooed head. For a long moment, Zuko was frozen. Azula had told him, but he hadn't truly absorbed it until now. The Avatar was a child. They couldn't . . .

He shook his head and ran to help his sister. This was the Avatar. They had to kill him or take him captive. It was that simple. The Dai Li had joined in the fight now, turning the tide of battle again, sending the Avatar and the girl in blue running. It turned out to be a fairly clever tactic, as the rapid chase through the tunnels brought the pair to a waterfall, placing the girl on much more equal footing with his sister.

As the battle raged, the Dai Li taking on his uncle and the Avatar, while his sister fought the girl, Zuko froze again. How could he help? Where could he help? He stepped forward, planning to back his sister up, when the waterbender spotted him. Her face seemed to light up. "Zuko!" she cried.

What?

"What are you waiting for?" Azula demanded.

His interruption seemed to have given the waterbender a second wind for some reason, and Azula was suddenly restrained, ice rapidly coating her body. Zuko knew how he could help, now. A few quick fire fists and Azula was free.

The girl in blue stared, shocked. "What are you doing?" she asked, sounding hurt.

"What?" he asked her. Why would she be surprised? They'd never even met before and wasn't it obvious from his clothing he was with the Fire Nation?

Azula shrieked, "Ignore her! She's just trying to confuse you!"

Zuko settled into a classic bending stance to face the girl, who seemed in complete shock. Azula had gone on to face the Avatar, leaving Zuko to deal with the waterbender. There was an interminable pause, then he launched his first attack, which she seemed to parry by reflex alone. "Zuko, why?" she asked, her voice cracking.

Azula may have said she was trying to distract him, but it was working. He had to find out what she meant. "What are you talking about?"

"Why are you doing this? After everything they've done to you, after everything you've said, why would you side with them now?"

The three were joined suddenly by a fourth figure who began to airbend. Zuko felt his jaw dropping, and the Dai Li surrounding them looked equally flummoxed. There was a moment of shock, then Zuko found himself faced with his sister.

But it wasn't his sister, because she was still fighting the Avatar.

"I guess mother was right," the woman said, tears streaming down her face. "There is no way to redeem a firebender."

They fought, air and fire clashing, Zuko baffled by this turn of events. Suddenly, a brilliant light lit up the cavern, causing every member of the melee to pause. The Avatar was glowing, seemingly about to begin some devastating attack. Azula kept her head, unlike everyone else, and a burst of brilliant lightning fell from her fingertips, blasting through the Avatar and sending the child's smoking body to the ground.

A scream of fury erupted from his sister's older doppelganger, and the airbender leapt at Azula. "What have you done, you monster!" she shrieked. "Katara! Go! Run! I'll keep them off!"

Within moments the pair were at each other in a display of sheer bending prowess unlike any Zuko had ever seen before. "Who are you?" demanded Azula.

"Nothing to you," sneered the double. "Just your superior, you morally bankrupt excuse for a bender."

"At least I'm not a weak and pathetic useless member of a dead people!" Azula shrieked back.

The double snapped, "I'd rather be a member of a dead people than a lying murderer!"

"I am the daughter of the Fire Lord!" Azula shouted, "I will not be spoken to like this!"

"So am I!" the double replied. "I am the eldest child of Fire Lord Ozai, so I have every right to discipline you, you spoiled brat!"

The distraction of the fight was such that the waterbender, Katara, Zuko reminded himself, had been able to leave entirely unmolested.

"The only one with a right to do that is the Fire Lord himself!"

"I suppose that arrogance only makes sense since you would never acknowledge our mother's fundamental superiority to a firebender."

Something in the way it was said made something in Zuko twist uncomfortably. Which made no sense, but this whole situation had gone completely mad.

"Nothing is superior to a firebender!" was Azula's reply. "What would you know of Mother, anyhow? Always calling me a monster, petting Zuzu all the time."

"That's because you're a monster," said the double.

"I may be a monster," Azula sneered, "But at least I will inherit the Fire Throne. What do you have?"

"Mother's love," said the other with a smirk.

"Take it back!"

Somehow, within moments, what had been the greatest bending battle Zuko had ever seen, turned into two sisters pulling each others' hair. He made an executive decision.

A flame fist later, both were unconscious on the ground, and Zuko was directing the Dai Li in his sister's stead to take the double captive and to follow up on the plans Azula had for bringing the city solidly under Fire Nation rule. The administrative necessities kept him distracted enough that he was able to ignore the guilt he felt for knocking his sister (sisters?) out, for taking over a city that had done nothing to the Fire Nation and for doing what he was supposed to in helping his sister kill the Avatar.

He had to focus. Azula had said this was the right thing to do, and she'd said it would get his father's approval. It was his most important goal, beyond the glory of the Fire Nation. Right?

It had to be right. Azula had told him so.

_Azula's always right_.

* * *

Post fic note: Yeah, I'm back in my bunker. Bring on the deadly projectiles! I'm ready!


End file.
